


Everybody is Expecting Rain (Or Else Making Love)

by TheBluestBluebird



Series: The Stars Are Beginning to Hide 'verse (A/B/O of my dreams) [3]
Category: Descendants (Disney Movies), The Isle of the Lost Series - Melissa de la Cruz
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Kinda, Multi, OT5
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:15:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 48,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28298109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBluestBluebird/pseuds/TheBluestBluebird
Summary: “He has a point, babe.” Evie says, all faux-casually, like it’s no big deal that Mal wasn’t flirting with the crown prince of Auradon. “That was some pretty heavy-handed flirting. I was going along with it because I thought you had some kind of plan for him.”
Relationships: Ben/Evie/Jay/Mal/Carlos de Vil, Evie/Jay/Mal/Carlos de Vil
Series: The Stars Are Beginning to Hide 'verse (A/B/O of my dreams) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2050911
Comments: 20
Kudos: 58





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This first part takes place directly after the end of the previous fic in this series (The Stars Are Beginning To Hide) and won’t make a whole ton of sense without it. 
> 
> Also! I’ve decided to go extremely self-indulgent with this one and as such all of the chapter breaks are placed for dramatic effect rather than any useful narrative reasons. It should be mostly coherent but also sometimes there’s a chapter that’s 1300 words next to one that’s 7000 words and that’s just how it’s gonna be!!! 
> 
> Warning for accidental (kind of) drug use, and descriptions of brain weasels/mental health fuckery.

“Uh, what the hell was  _ that? _ ” 

“What?” Mal asks. 

Jay stares at her. “That flirting you were just doing with Ben?” 

“What, that? That wasn’t—it was nothing.” Mal waves a hand dismissively, “Like you’ve never flirted with people.”

Jay isn’t buying it. “Not  _ Ben _ .” he insists. 

“He has a point, babe.” Evie says, all faux-casually, like it’s no big deal that Mal  _ wasn’t _ flirting with the crown prince of Auradon. “That was some pretty heavy-handed flirting. I was going along with it because I thought you had some kind of plan for him.”

Mal can feel her mouth drop open. “I just—he’s interested! He likes us, you guys!”

“He likes  _ you, _ ” Evie says, significantly. She looks kind of upset, like it’s just occuring to her that somebody else might think Mal is pretty, might think she’s worth their time and energy to flirt with, even though Evie is right there looking better with her artfully smudged eyeliner than Mal will ever look in her entire life. 

“No, Mal’s got a point.” Jay cuts in, interrupting Mal’s discovery that she might possibly be a little bit mad at her girlfriend. “I think he likes us.” 

It’s Evie’s turn now to look absolutely enraged. Mal hopes she flushes red with it, and her skin goes blotchy and uneven with rage and ruins her perfect china-doll face. 

Of course, because Mal just can’t win, Evie’s mouth drops open in an elegant red circle, red as blood, as a shiny apple, as the gates of hell themselves. “He’s never flirted with me!” Evie cries. “He likes-- he--!” 

Mal shouldn’t be glad that Evie is too flustered to form sentences. That she can’t just say what she means with a perfect smile to carry it along and get her point across. The curl of--  _ emotion,  _ that’s it, bubbling up in Mal’s chest isn’t because Evie is finally losing her composure. It’s  _ not.  _

“I think he likes, uh,” Jay nods at their last member, who has been suspiciously quiet so far. “a few of us.” 

Evie moves closer, eyes flashing dangerously. “Oh, so not me or you?” she spits “He’s into the sweet little things, is that it?” 

Jay leans into Evie’s space right back. “Think so, yeah.” he says, voice low and calm, like this is something that happens every day. 

Fine. If Jay is too much of a wuss to press the issue and actually deal with their problem, Mal can do it herself. “You’re being awfully quiet, C,” Mal breaks in sweetly, “Do you think Ben likes us?” 

Carlos is doing something very intense with his cup, which apparently requires all of his attention, to the point that he won’t even look up and meet Mal’s eyes. Boys, honestly. Without her, they’d never get anything done. “Do you think Ben likes us?” Mal repeats. “Jay seems to think so.” 

Carlos is shaking his head, very slightly. He won’t fucking look her in the eyes, and if Mal can face down her mother at full power for the good of the group, he can damn well give her the respect she deserves and look her in the face as he lies to her. Mal clicks her fingers right under his nose, where he can’t help but notice her. “Furball! I’m talking to you!” 

His eyes flicker up to her, but only for a second. “I don’t know,” he says quietly, “I wasn’t listening.” 

Mal snaps. “You were!” she shouts. “I know you were listening because you’re  _ right here,  _ and if you want to stay in my good graces after the night that I’ve had, you need to get it together and give me an answer.” 

Carlos’ hands freeze on his cup, but he still won’t look Mal in the eyes. Little freak. “I don’t  _ know, _ ” he insists “Ben flirts with everyone. He’s just like that.”

“No, baby, people just flirt with you all the time because you’re a sweetheart. Ben does  _ not  _ flirt with everyone.” Evie says. 

“He doesn’t flirt with me either.” Jay adds. He’s trying to play peacemaker, like an idiot. Peace doesn’t get anybody shit, and look at what happened the last time villains got caught up in trying to be peaceful and cooperative. Look where it’s gotten them. “Eves, I’m pretty sure it’s not for lack of interest.” he finishes. 

Evie stares. “Just say what you mean.” 

Jay spreads his hands. “You and Mal act bonded. If he’s really a beta, doing things the ‘right way’ by Auradon standards means he would have to go to your alpha to declare intent.”

“So he’s what, flirting with Mal to get at all of us?” 

Jay shrugs. “I don’t know! Maybe, yeah.”

“How are you the smart one about this?” Mal asks. She’s not happy with him, but okay, yeah, there might be something to this idea. It’s possible that there’s a reason he’s her second in command, and it’s not just because he’s not awful looking, for a boy. 

Jay shoots her a grin. If she were anyone else, he’d be trying to get her skirt off by this point, probably. “Practice, babe. I’ve hooked up with more people than you’ve even fantasized about. I know how to read a room.” 

“Please, I’ve had way more dating experience than you.” Mal snorts, “I’ve had fucking rivalries in the time it takes you to get a girl to stop smacking you every time you open your mouth. Do you really wanna play this game? You’ve been with what, two pirates?”

“Do all the pretty betas on our half of the island not count as people, now?”

Oh, he is so on. Mal isn’t angry now so much as she is all keyed up and spoiling for a good fight, and she and Jay could do this all night. Arguing is a great way to get him to fall into bed with her, and a good tussle could turn into just the thing she needs to shake off this mood. They could get the others involved, even, fight for their chosen partner or something. 

Mal is all ready to go, to get some of the tension out after this weird fucking argument, when Evie lays a hand on her arm.

“Could we maybe not do this right now?” she says softly. 

Evie is usually okay with Mal getting rowdy as long as she can direct it at someone who’s not her. Mal is tempted to shake her off and keep going anyway, but Jay is leaning back, disengaging before Mal can pull him back in. 

“Sorry, Eves.” Jay is saying, and he’s pulling back, letting Evie guide Mal away from him. 

Wait,  _ what?  _

Evie uses her grip on Mal’s arm to turn her bodily around to face the bathroom. “We are all too tired and worked up to be having this conversation right now.” she’s saying, “Mal, babe, I want you to go and get the shower started for me. I have been around  _ way _ too much dust today to go to bed without rinsing my hair, at least.”

Evie wants her to be in the shower. Okay. That’s something Mal can deal with. “Got it.” Mal says, even though she’s not really sure where this is going. She wants to fight, to bite and claim her family, her pack. The shower isn’t the ideal place for that-- 

Unless Evie wants to fuck, and they have a pack member who doesn’t like that, who’s extra sensitive right now, and--

Oh. 

Shit. 

“Jay, baby, you stay here, okay?” Evie is saying, even as she’s hustling Mal into the bathroom, and okay, Mal gets it, she shouldn’t have yelled, she’s being irrational, acting like some knothead who can’t control herself around a pretty omega, but that doesn’t mean she needs to be taken out of the room, she can stay calm, she can get herself under control-- 

Jay is standing up too, putting a physical barrier between her and their littlest pack member, which is overkill, okay, she’s fine, she’s cool, she doesn’t need to be separated from where Carlos is still sitting-- 

Still frozen, clever fingers locked around that stupid cup. 

Mal lets herself be hustled out of the room. “Sorry, Eves.” she says, as she lets her girlfriend drag her away. “I’m sorry, babe.” 

Evie heaves in a sigh. “Yeah.” she says. “Yeah, Mal. You should be.” 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a long 'un. Contains descriptions of anxiety throughout, and some questionable drug use. 
> 
> It's also got happier stuff! Kids being soft and taking care of each other! Scheming! All that Good Content! It's just hidden in the middle of a big old angst sandwich this chapter :))

Carlos isn’t here. He’s not here, so he doesn’t have to deal with how he feels bad, because it’s not like he doesn’t know that he’s being an inconvenience right now. Always the weak link, the baby who can’t deal with things. Always the one who does dumb shit, even though he’s also usually the one who gets them out of it too. It doesn’t matter, can’t be balanced out with being useful when he’s like this. Always the one who ruins it for everyone, always his fault, he’s aware. 

They were _yelling,_ is the thing, and it’s just easier to freeze up when people (when Mal, and her mom, or Evie’s mom, or-- or anybody else, really) are yelling, freeze up and play dead and hope that it’ll stop soon, because they can’t keep going forever. He can stay still for longer than they can yell, that’s a given. 

It’s not a nice feeling, but it is a little bit comforting, not being aware of his body. Like he’s flying, somewhere that isn’t here. Not anywhere special, just-- somewhere else. Some place where time goes gooey and unreal and it’s easy to wait it out, whatever it is this time, and he can just sink into it and not deal with the real world for a little while. 

The yelling always has to stop first, because time is still moving for them, and they can’t stick in the moment forever, they _can’t,_ they have to stop sometime, they’ve _got to stop--_

Somebody squeezes his arm. 

Aw, fuck. 

“— in the girl’s room.” Jay is saying. It sounds like he’s been going for a while, maybe. “We’re in Auradon. You’re okay, man, you can come back now. We’re done arguing.” 

_Fuck._

Jay is just _looking_ at him, all nice and stuff. Talking, not touching anymore. It’s sort of nice, knowing that he remembered not to touch once he’s got Carlos to remember that he does in fact have a physical body. And, okay, that’s not a helpful thought, realizing that Jay had to take the time to remember important shit about keeping his packmate functional, because it just makes Carlos feel _worse._ There’s some complicated shit in his brain around people being nice to him, and most of it is pretty sure that nice is a _trap, they’re lying, they want something,_ and even if they’re being sincere that’s on them, not because he’s done something to deserve it. 

It’s enough to break out of the last _bad-useless-weak_ thought cycle at least, break through the freeze response and switch to just feeling like shit in a normal way instead. So that’s cool. 

Jay notices, because he’s an observant kinda dude, and backs off a bit. “Hey.” he tries. “You okay now?” 

Ugh. Okay is relative. Totally fucked in the head, yeah. Not stuck waiting for the next bad thing anymore, yeah, sure, he’s out of that, but he’s not _okay._

Breathe. It’s all about that, all the books say so. Carlos sucks in one long breath (in for seven, out for four), and then another, before he can begin to figure out what the fuck is going on. “Where’re the girls.” he asks, instead of answering. 

Jay is still just _looking_ at him. “In the shower.” he says “Evie wanted to get clean. Why, you wanna join them?”

Carlos is pretty sure that even if he could open his mouth right now, he wouldn’t be able to get words out. It happens sometimes. He shakes his head. Nope, no way is he bothering Mal when she’s in a mood. 

Jay nods. “Just checking.” He’s telegraphing his movements, which is probably him trying to be considerate, but it just comes across as kinda weird. They’ve done some weird shit together, and moving up to gently crush your bro under the weight of your entire body isn’t even close to being weird or unwelcome. 

It’s easier for Carlos to let out a full breath with the solid weight of Jay on top of him, crushing his lungs. There’s no research on this kind of thing, not that Carlos and Evie have been able to find yet, but it’s probably a pack thing. They’re pretty sure. Normal people don’t like being flattened to the ground and held down so they can barely breathe, so it’s got to be a pack thing, something about physical reassurance or claiming behavior or something else that the Auradon couples don’t care about anymore. 

Jay bites his neck, nipping at the skin until there’s a red spot coming up. It isn’t something that Carlos would let the girls do, but it’s different with Jay. Not so weird. It’s something they’ve done for a while, not as part of anything else (hooking up, Carlos’ brain reminds him. _Getting some. Doin’ it._ ) but just as a thing they do. Casual marking between bros. 

Jay licks over the spot for good measure. “I’m probably not gonna hose off before I pass out on you, man.” he says. “Hope that’s cool.”

Carlos flashes him a thumbs-up. Talking isn’t a realistic goal, but communicating isn’t difficult. Jay nods, and licks the other side of his neck too. Keeping things even, that’s good. “You need anything?” he asks. 

Not thirsty. Not hungry. Bladder situation is fine. Carlos shakes his head. He’s okay. 

Jay bites him again “You sure, furball?” he asks. “It’s not a problem if you do. You’re allowed to want shit.”

Carlos wants lots of things. A long-term plan for what they’re going to do after the coronation, that’d be really cool to have. A permanent solution for the situation with their parents, he wants that too, and a spare textbook for his geometry class so that he won’t have to keep swapping off with SJ, who leaves water marks on all the pages. He wants to see familiar food in the dining hall, and not have to guess at every meal what he’ll like or not. He wants to not feel watched every time he leaves their rooms, and he wants to own a few more markers, so that when the assholes who like to fuck up their shit every chance they get inevitably take the ones he’s covered in capsacian oil, he’ll have enough left to write with. 

What he’d really like is to not lose control over his body every three months, but some things are too much to hope for, even if everything goes exactly to plan. He’s tired of feeling like garbage, and really, that one’s probably the easiest fix, so--

“Nh.” Carlos says, eloquently, and squirms so that he’s got his entire body underneath Jay. A nice living blanket, that’s also a friend. Pack. Someone who can be trusted. 

Gods, Carlos is so tired of not being able to trust anyone. At least at home he knew what people were about, for the most part. Pirates, they’re jerks. Hunters were usually just as bad, and the kids from the docks, while kind of cool for the most part, couldn’t be trusted with anything, because they made a game of breaking shit as quick as he could fix it. On the isle, if someone acts sweet, they want something, and they’ll stay sweet until they get it. Here, people will act nice to your face and then throw spitballs at you as you leave, in the same breath even. Carlos doesn’t miss the isle, that’s for damn sure, but he does miss being able to trust that people want what they say they want, and won’t do things like sit with you at dinner and then spend the entire meal telling you everything you’re doing wrong and acting like they’re trying to help while they’re doing it, and then telling their friends about everything those stupid isle kids did, until the whole school knows--

The pressure shifts. Jay’s moving, for some reason. 

“Hey, C? What’s going on in that brain of yours?” he asks, soft-like. 

Nothing good, is the answer to that one. That’s too easy. It’s never good, and heat makes his brain all foggy and sleepy-stupid anyway, and that feeling combined with the lingering _bad-worthless-nobody likes you_ feelings is really bad. Oh, gods.

Jay shifts, and a piece of his hair slides out of Evie’s soft scrunchie and into his face. “Carlos? Bud? You have to talk to me, man. I can’t read your mind.” 

Carlos growls. He just feels _bad._ There’s no words for it. 

Jay goes to put a hand on his forehead, and Carlos turns, rubbing his cheek against the scent glands on Jay’s wrist instead. It doesn’t get rid of the idea that everyone in Auradon is out to get him, personally, but it helps a little bit. Pack being there. Here. Whatever. 

“Oh.”

Carlos arches his neck, showing off the marks at his throat. Inviting more. Pack shit feels not-bad. He breathes in, and out. 

“Yeah.” he says quietly. 

“Do—Should I get the girls?”

Jay sounds not-happy, and that’s bad. Still, bothering the girls when they’re busy is also bad, and they’ll probably be done soon anyway. Not even Evie and Mal can go on forever, not when it’s late like this. No. The girls will come out when they’re done. No need to get them. 

There’s a hand on his chin, stilling him. “Do you want, uh, anything else? You can move me wherever, you know.”

The bed is good, it feels nice and soft and comfortable, but it’s not very easy to defend, and the alcove from this morning, where he and Jay had spent a _very_ nice morning together before things went all awful is looking better and better.

Fuck it. They’re going back to the floor. Carlos already has a pretty good grip on Jay’s shirt, so it’s not hard to just-- pull him along. It’s easier than explaining. 

“Okay, man! I’m moving!”

He’s being dragged, more like it, but Carlos absolutely does not have it in him to care. Today has been full of some of the most insane heat bullshit they’ve ever dealt with, and this sucks enough even without all of the extra stuff that happened, and he just—He wants to be on the floor, where it’s safe and comfortable and _familiar,_ and-- 

It doesn’t register that he’s crying until someone is wiping the tears off his face. Fuck. Could today suck any worse if it tried?

“Baby? You okay?”

Evie. She’s been safe even longer than the other two, she’s _his,_ and Carlos doesn’t even think, he just flails out at her like a maniac (and ugh, it’s the _worst_ ) trying to get to her, to _Evie_ and _familiar_ and _safe._

“It’s okay, baby,” Evie says. “You can cry on me.”

It’s not, Evie is supposed to be clean and soft and pretty and she doesn’t like things to be messy and she hates crying, doing it and watching people do it, she doesn’t like when people get weepy, Jay is the best one if you’re going to cry, he’s good at ignoring it and just moving on, they’re not supposed to be _weak_ like this, it’s—

“Mal, can you get the painkillers from the table? I need to see the package”

No, _no,_ no more drugs, please, he doesn’t want them, doesn’t need them, doesn’t want to take anything else in case it makes this all worse again, and he already feels so bad—

“Damnit,” Evie says, from somewhere in the sky. Evie isn’t supposed to swear, she cares about being proper, even though that’s stupid and she’s not an Auradon lady no matter what her mom says, she’s just as Isle as the rest of them--

“What?” Mal demands. She’s being kind of loud, like she might start yelling again soon, so Carlos tucks his head in his arms just in case. 

Evie still sounds like she’s a thousand miles away, even though he’s fairly sure she’s also one of the people he’s touching. Evie’s tall, she can be in both places at once. “There’s tritain in this.” Evie says from her place in the sky.

“What does that mean?” Mal asks. She sounds mad, that’s bad, alpha shouldn’t be mad.

Evie is petting his back, which he can’t curl to protect, and it feels weird. Not like usual. It doesn't feel good. Touch is supposed to feel good, and it’s not _fair._

Evie is talking. It would be easier to just freeze up again, to zone out and resurface once Evie has figured out how to fix everything, but of course now that everyone is talking in low, tense voices he can’t even get that right.

“It’s fine!” Evie is saying, “this is not something we need to freak out about! It’s marketed as relieving heat headaches, which is probably why Fairy Godmother gave it to him. It’s just a headache medication.” 

Mal is pacing. “Why is that bad?” she’s saying. 

Maybe because he’s going insane? It’s nice to know that the terrible shivery-bad feeling is less visible from the outside, but this kind of feels worse than when his brain was melting earlier, and that’s saying something. 

“It makes Isle kids paranoid. I don’t know why, but it comes over in the relief bundles from the FIA, and it’s done this to a _lot_ of the kids.” 

“Can we fix it?” Mal asks. Always the problem-solver. Fixing it probably means shoving a finger down his throat, which is disgusting, or charcoal, which is equally gross but will probably hurt less. 

Evie smooths her hand down his back. It _hurts,_ which isn’t fair. Touch isn’t supposed to hurt. “It’s not physically dangerous, and I’m pretty sure it _is_ fixing your headache, right baby?” she says. 

Oh. That’s a direct question. Uh-huh. His head doesn’t hurt anymore, just everything else. His skin, all over. Carlos is pretty sure he nods, but it’s hard to tell. 

“Okay.” Evie says, and puts a hand on his head, stilling him. “You’re okay. It’ll wear off, probably in a few hours. It doesn’t look like this is a very strong dosage, but I guess we didn’t give you anything to eat first, baby, which was a bad call, huh?” She’s petting his hair back, and it feels okay, not as bad as a minute ago. She’s probably right, and it’s going to wear off and everything is going to be fine and he’s not actually dying and doesn’t need to throw up again. “You’re so skinny, so it’s probably a bigger dose than you’re supposed to get when you’re all fucked up like this. They’re probably kicking in just now, if you took them before we got in the shower, so after we ride off this first rush, you’re gonna feel a lot better, alright?”

Carlos wants to trust Evie, he _does,_ but no, no no no, they’re gonna leave him alone like this if he says yes, he can’t, he _can’t--_

Evie’s right, of course. It’s—okay, actually, time is hard to judge when he’s out of his head like this. It’s probably less than twenty minutes before the worst of it is over.

God. Fuck. It’s awful enough with the regular forced vulnerability of heats already, so of course they had to give him the drugs that make him hysterical and paranoid, just to add another layer of shit to the day that it’s been.

Evie’s been—getting stuff settled. Fixing everyone up. Dealing with his shit, and Mal’s shit, and everyone’s gross sweaty clothes and stuff. Mal’s been pacing around, trying to help her, probably, or maybe just standing guard. She’s not a very cuddly kind of alpha. The best for when you want someone to rip an asshole’s head off for sniffing at you wrong, but not the greatest person to go to for some friendly heat cuddles. Mal and Evie are their own thing anyway, and they’re usually connected in a way that makes him feel like an outsider, even though by all rights, Carlos knew Evie first.

And now he’s shaking again. Great. Evie can care about more than one person at a time, he _knows_ that, he’s not _stupid,_ but the paranoia is telling him that she’s going to leave him alone forever so she can run away with Mal, and okay, it’s not like he usually wants to touch the girls all that much anyway, he could probably make do with like, just their jackets or something, maybe the blanket that he pulled down here earlier—

He’s going to run _out of tears, damnit._

Evie notices, because she’s basically perfect. She’s not going to run away with Mal. She’s right here, with her cool hands brushing the hot tears off his face before they can even fall. She wouldn’t leave. She’s not some shitty half-rate alpha fuckhead who only follows him around because he smells good, she’s his best friend, she wouldn’t _leave—_

He wants to scream, because this isn’t _rational,_ it’s still the stupid fucking drugs, he shouldn’t have taken them, it wasn’t so bad, really, a little headache after a whole day of his body being on _fire_ should have been nothing, but no, he’s the idiot who thought that maybe he would try and reach out for one of the good things they keep offering him, and this is what he gets. Isle kids don’t get to have nice things, and if you try? Fuck you, have a fucking drug trip when you’re already exhausted and hysterical from your body trying to literally kill you earlier in the day.

“Breathe, baby.” Evie says, like he’s not trying. “I know it sucks, baby, but you have to breathe.”

He sucks in a deep breath. It makes him cough, and ew, that’s not something he ever needed to see come out of his body.

Evie is unbothered by gross sticky body fluids, which is good on a couple levels right now, snot and otherwise. “That’s it,” she says, encouraging. “Keep breathing for me, okay? This is probably the last of it, you’re gonna be alright.”

“Fuck.”

Evie’s stroking sweaty pieces of hair out of his face. “Yeah.” she says. “I’m _so_ sorry.”

“Not your fault.” 

The twist of Evie’s mouth says she doesn’t believe it, but she nods anyway. “We should have done a better job keeping you safe.” 

Ugh. There’s a time and a place to talk about Evie’s guilt complex re: taking care of people, taking care of _him_ , specifically, but Carlos is pretty sure that he’s going to cry again if he has to think about another emotion tonight, and he really can’t handle that. “Can we do this later?” he asks, pathetically. He’s got no shame left around Evie. She can deal with his sweaty-mess self. 

Evie runs a hand through her own hair, still damp from the shower and not yet braided for bed. “Yeah.” she says. “That sounds fine. Later.” 

Cool. That settled, Carlos lets his head fall heavily onto Evie’s lap again. “I’m so fucking tired.” he whines. 

Evie switches back over to petting his hair. “I bet.” she says, not without sympathy. “We’re going to bed just as soon as we get settled, okay?” 

Jay is hovering, somewhere on the edge of the floor nest. “Do you want me to bring more blankets over?” he asks. “We can probably make enough space for the girls to sleep on the floor.” 

Urgh. “Eves likes sleeping in a bed.” Carlos tells him, even though he really, _really_ doesn’t want to move off the floor and up where it’s too-soft and not hidden. The idea of moving away from Evie is even worse, though, and Evie likes sleeping in her pink princess bed, so he can do this for her. It’s kind of sad that they don’t all fit in one bed very well, because being in the middle would feel really nice right about now, but it’s not worth making the others lose sleep over. Evie can be enough. 

Evie is shaking his shoulder. Oops. “Don’t try and bullshit me right now, Carlos de Vil.” she says, and she’s not yelling, but she is pissed. “You want to sleep on the floor, and you know it.” 

Mal stops pacing and glares down at their sad little blanket pile. It probably looks worse than it actually is, what with all the frantic grabbing and stuff messing all the piles up. They had it perfect this morning. “We’re staying where you’re comfortable.” she says, and that’s that. 

Maybe, sometimes, he can have one nice thing. 

Mal and Jay pull the rest of the blankets off of the girl’s beds, and bring them down to the floor like the good alphas they are. It’s a stupid stereotype, and probably if they’re being totally honest it’s more of the beta stereotype thing to do, bring blankets so that the pack can curl up comfortably together on the floor, but it’s still kind of nice. Not super comfortable, even with the new additions, because it’s still a floor at the end of the day, and they’re still just a couple of blankets off of dorm room beds, but it’s something. Not comfortable, because Carlos is pretty sure he’s never going to feel comfortable again, but it’s tolerable. 

“Fuck, guys, I’m sorry I’m so fucked up.” he says. They aren’t going to listen, probably, but he’s gotta try to apologize for making them deal with his shit. 

Evie twists a curl around her fingers, tightening it up. They had to move, briefly, while the others were getting their new and improved nest set up, but they’re back now. “You’re like, objectively not.” she says. “Your body is kind of sabotaging you on a couple different levels right now.”

“Would it help if we got high too?” Jay offers. “We could balance your crazy out.”

Carlos shakes his head. No way would that help. “Mal would try and drop paint cans out the window again.” he says, instead of explaining that he _needs_ them to stay in control right now. 

Mal looks over at that. “Probably, yeah.” she says. “S’that a problem?” 

“Babe--” 

Oh, jeez. If the girls get going about the paint splatters on the roof again, they’re never going to shut up about it, and Carlos will _die._ “Can we just sleep? Please?” he begs. “No paint, no--- no nothin’.” 

“Oh gods, I hope so!” Mal says, clearly resisting the urge to say some other dumb thing that’s going to set him off with the waterworks again. “Get comfy, kids.”

There’s a minute where everybody is trying to pile under the same blanket at once, which doesn’t work, and then another bad second when Mal accidentally shoves Evie down in an attempt to secure her place on the outside of the pile, but they work it out eventually. Mal gets the side closest to the door, Jay gets his back against a wall, Evie gets to be next to her girlfriend, and Carlos gets to be in the middle. Perfect. 

Jay throws an arm over Carlos, pulling him up close enough that they can share the same blanket comfortably, no arms or legs outside the ride. “Night, everyone.” he says. “Wake up better, okay furball?”

“I’ll try” Carlos mumbles, and then, without any kind of effort on his part, his eyes slip closed and that’s it, he’s out, dead asleep before he can even find the energy to protest. 

+++

Mal wakes up before dawn, in the time when everything outside is grey and dark and formless. She’s a habitual insomniac, but this is a little much even for her. Sure, she’s a dark fairy trying to adjust her natural crepuscular rhythms to those of the human world, but she’d like to sleep through the night every once in a while. 

She lays there for a moment, in a pile with her people on the floor of the room that she now calls hers, on the mainland that she was raised to believe she would never touch unless she was burning it to the ground. It’s strange, realizing some of your dreams are so much more realistic than you ever thought, and still knowing in your bones that you’re from a land of nightmares and you’re never going to be allowed to have the things that other people have taken for granted since they were babies. 

Mal shakes her head, internally. It’s no use thinking about what she isn’t allowed to have, when there’s so much that she’s going to get, just as soon as she can grab Fairy Godmother’s wand. She’s going to give it to her mother, of course. She doesn’t want the responsibility of running an island, much less the mainland. Maleficent wants power, which is fine for her, but in trying to teach her daughter the value of being a ruler, she also taught her firsthand how much work goes into balancing the politics of an island full of murderers, thieves, and criminals, and Mal is positive that she does not want the responsibility of that, no matter how much joy she might get out of ordering around subjugated Auradon brats. She’d much rather keep her role as royal brat, causing evil where she sees fit, and bending others to her will just when she needs them, without the maintenance required by a constant leadership role. 

Mal might not want to be an evil queen, but she’s sure as shit going to make herself an unholy terror, just as soon as she gets her hands on that magic wand. 

For now, though, she’s going to check on her crew, which will be easier than usual with all of them asleep in a pile next to her, and then rest in the warm and comfortable room that she calls her own until the light comes in, and her pack wakes up, and she can get on with the plan. 

Evie is easy to check up on. She’s curled up around Mal’s own body, long legs tangled up in the sheets with Mal’s, her hands folded under her head like the pretty princess she is at heart. She’s sleeping peacefully, with soft snuffling breaths that she won’t admit are snores. Evie’s had her own bedroom from a young age, so nobody ever smacked her as a kid until she stopped, and now Mal’s too whipped to bring herself to do it. It’s cute as hell, really. 

But, all good things have to come to an end, and Mal can’t see the boys over Evie’s sleeping body, although she can hear the sound of other people’s soft breathing, so she knows they haven’t run away in the night. As much as she wants to stay tangled up in Evie’s sleepy cuddles forever, she does need to check on the others. 

Mal carefully uncurls her body from around Evie’s, pushing herself up on one arm so that she can look over her girlfriend’s shoulder at the boys. One dark head poking out of the blankets, check. Jay is a heavy sleeper, which is dangerous when they need to wake up and run in a matter of seconds, but useful in this case. Auradon doesn't care about things like making sure their children are safe in the night, so they haven’t needed to make the jump from dead sleep to awareness in weeks. Mal worries about it, sometimes. She doesn’t want him to lose the skill, but when she’s in power it won’t matter anyway, so she lets him get away with it most nights. 

Curled up next to Jay, mostly outside of the blankets, Carlos is twitching. He always does that, moving around in his sleep. He kicks, too, so much that Mal can’t share a bed with him. They used to think it would make the most sense to put the lightest sleepers together, but Carlos can just go back to sleep every time he wakes himself up, and Mal can’t settle down again once she’s up, so they dropped that idea after a few weeks of bad nights. He’s probably going to wake himself in a second, if Mal’s time sharing a room has taught her right. They’ve already been up with him once tonight, when whatever shitty medication Fairy Godmother gave them meant he woke up a few hours ago already crying and couldn’t stop on his own. Mal woke up the others, for that. If this is another case, she’ll probably wake them up again. Evie will just go back to sleep after, but it might be early enough in the morning by now for Jay to stay awake with her. 

Sure enough, not even a moment later, Carlos twitches himself awake again. He’s not upset this time, which is a score in Mal’s book. He’s just awake, blinking out into the semi-darkness of the room. Mal can see him, but he probably won’t be able to see her unless she moves. 

“Mal?” 

Or maybe not. 

“I’m here.” Mal says softly, mindful of how Evie is still curled up peacefully between them. “Morning.” 

It’s hard to see. Mal’s eyes work better in the dark than most people’s, but she’s a fairy, not a sprite, and her night vision isn’t perfect. From what she can see, Carlos is just laying there, but it’s hard to know what to say when you’re scared and not feeling great, and even though Mal’s been trying to get him and Evie both to speak up when they want something, it’s a lesson that’s been hard to enforce. It’s easy to throw food at them, but it’s harder to get them to do things like admit that yeah, their fragile human bodies could use a little more heat, and yes, they do like sleeping in a pile like they’re doing tonight. It’s not that Mal’s much better, when it comes to like, emotional needs and stuff, but at least she knows when to make a scene about the things her body needs, which is more than some of them do. 

Of course, part of being the leader is also knowing when to push through and not holler every time you hurt, and maybe that’s something to take into consideration too. It’s gotta be hard, being literally dependent on the whims of other people for your physical safety, so maybe Mal should cut her boy some slack and be the one to offer. 

“Do you--” 

“Can I--” 

They both stop. Mal hesitates for a moment, and then, when it becomes clear that Carlos is waiting for her to speak first, rolls away from Evie just enough that she can open her arms in silent invitation. 

Luckily, the gesture is visible even in the dark of their bedroom, and Carlos scrambles across the sleeping bodies in the space between them with only minimally more care than he’d give to the folks in the boarding house back on the isle. 

Something in Mal settles down a bit, once she’s got her packmate held safe and close against her body. She can shield him this way, if anybody were to come inside. The knife taped under the bed frame is at the perfect height to grab like this, and she could be quick, to the door and back before her spot even gets cold. 

“We’re quite the pair, aren’t we?” she whispers. 

Carlos lets out a warm breath against Mal’s neck. “Late night bros ride again.” he whispers back, and Mal can hear the hint of a smile in his voice. She squeezes him a little tighter for it, like he’s the doll she used to have as a child. She’s still got it somewhere, if they ever make it back to their hideout. They’ve been gone for weeks now, but the hideout is hidden in the top floor of one of the warehouses, and they have the hidden mechanism to make the ladder drop, so unless one of the brats figures out how to open the trapdoor, they’re probably safe. 

If one of the kids does find their way in, it’s not like that’s the end of the world either. It’s not like it’s difficult to kick some little kids out, and the bratlings could make use of their food stores anyway. Maybe Dizzy and her crew of cousins will figure it out. Mal wouldn’t put it past Evie to have told them where the hideout is, just in case something happens and they do end up figuring out a safe way of staying here without their parents finding out. 

Mal shakes off the thought of what might be going on back home. She’s got enough to do here in Auradon before she even starts worrying about what’s going on at home, starting with the kid in her arms. Carlos seems like he’s doing okay, but it’s always hard to tell with him. Mal gives him a little squeeze, just in case it’ll help. 

“Do you want to go out?” she whispers. “We could get food, or something.” 

The way to her boy’s hearts is always with food, she’s learned. Give a boy a shitty cup of goblin brew, and you’ll be stuck with them for life, or something like that. Mal doesn’t know what the Auradon version of the saying is. 

“I kinda want to stay here.” Carlos whispers back. “Can we go back to sleep?” 

“Sure.” Mal pets his hair, which he doesn’t especially like from most people, but puts up with from her. She’s not as good as Evie at keeping his fluffy curls un-fluffed, but she puts in the effort, this time. “Can I make you drink something first?” 

There’s a long pause. It’s entirely possible that Carlos is asleep again, the lucky bastard. 

“I would feel better if you let me water you,” Mal admits, into the silence. “I’ll water you like a plant, bub, put you up on my windowsill to keep you all green and shiny.” 

That gets a laugh, barely. A heavy exhale, but Mal knows the intent behind it, and it makes her feel hot and pleased inside. “Y’re weird, Mali.” Carlos mumbles. He lets his speech slide when he’s all tired and relaxed like this. It’s cute. “Go’head. Y’all always wanna water me.” 

“Instinct, babey!” Mal crows, pushing up and out of their nest. “Shit.” 

The motion, or the noise, or maybe both together have disturbed Evie. She’s not really awake yet, but after the night that they’ve had, she’s ready to wake up at the slightest thing, and apparently Mal getting out of bed is enough to disturb her. Shit. Evie is _not_ the one to wake up for midnight emergencies. 

Mal makes a frantic gesture at Carlos, who stares at her like an idiot. _Pat her shoulder or something,_ she gestures. _Don’t let her wake up._

Slowly, Carlos moves to hold his hand just shy of touching Evie’s back. He’s staring up at Mal, which is totally counterproductive to their mission here. Evie needs at least six hours of sleep in order to function, and she’s not going to get that if her pack keeps acting like a bunch of bumbling idiots. 

“ _Shh,”_ Mal starts to hiss-- 

Evie stirs anyway. “Was’at?” she mumbles “Who’s’it?” 

Mal winces. “Nothing, babe.” she says, as soothing as possible. 

Carlos leans his entire body against Evie, like he’s going to lure her back to sleep with the weight of his bony little self. “Go to sleep, Eves.” he whispers, rubbing his head against her shoulder. 

Ohh. Marking her with sleepy-safe pack pheromones is almost clever. Mal gets it now. 

Evie rubs at her eyes instead, staring at Mal. She still doesn’t seem to be very awake. “Why’re you _up_?” she asks. 

“Insomnia gang never rests!” Mal exclaims as softly as she can manage. “You can sleep.” 

Evie yawns. “Y’gotta sleep with me. No bein’-- being up. S’too-- sleep.” 

“Okay, babe.” Mal tells her. “In a second.” 

“Mhm.” Evie mumbles, already closing her eyes again. 

Mal stays frozen for a second, until she’s sure that Evie is down again, and then releases the near-hysterical giggles that she’d been holding back. “You heard the girl.” she tells Carlos, very seriously. There’s a water bottle sitting on the desk that looks mostly full, so she grabs it just in case he’s still willing to be watered. “I guess we’re going to sleep.” 

Carlos flops over, but not before taking a chug from the bottle Mal pushes into his hands. “Fine with me,” he says. “C’n I stay here?” 

Mal takes a second to stow the bottle safely under the bed with the knives, where it probably won’t spill on them later, and spoons up behind her boy. “Yeah. Littlest spoon it up, furball.” 

“Don’be mean,” Carlos mumbles. “Don’--” 

It’s too easy. “I’ll be as mean as I want.” Mal says softly. 

“Noo…” 

Aw. It’s almost sweet, watching his eyes slip closed even though his mouth is still moving. It’s like watching a pet run in their sleep, and it makes Mal want to kill anybody who even thinks about messing with him ever again. She likes to think that she’s not an unnecessarily violent person, but something about watching her family sleep always brings out the homicidal maniac in her. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's the end of the first section!! Next up: More Fun Times With Ben, and some time skipping. 
> 
> Warnings in this chapter for mentions of past sexual assault and some brief food stuff. Read with your own limits in mind.

Evie’s phone chimes around eleven. She leans out of her place at the bottom of the pile to snag the glossy smartphone from where it’s plugged in to the wall.

“It’s Ben,” she announces, reading the text. “He says, quote, is it still cool if I stop by? End quote. Also, apparently, he’s been trying to reach Mal, and she isn’t answering.”

Mal sits up halfway. Her phone is probably in the pile of jackets that got thrown somewhere around the end of the bed in the scramble last night. Probably. She doesn’t really care. “I was a little busy.”

Evie is tapping out a reply with her glossy perfect fingernails. The rhythmic clicking is oddly comforting to listen to. “Not busy enough to  _ ignore the prince,  _ babe!” she says. “He’s worried about you!”

Mal flops back down on top of Evie’s legs. “It’s fine, he’s texting you. When does he want to show up?”

Evie frowns down at the phone screen. That’s not ideal. Evie shouldn’t be frowning at things. She’s in a nice cozy pile with her pack, and they’re all together somewhere dry and safe, and there’s no reason, Mal’s hindbrain cries, for Evie to be sad. “He says maybe at lunch?” she says. “He’ll bring food if we tell him what we want.”

Mal strokes her hand over Evie’s bare leg, soothing. “All of it? Can he bring all of the food?”

She’s still frowning down at the phone. “I don’t think he’s going to go for that. There’s, um, he says he’ll bring us boxes from the dining hall if we want them.”

“Yes.” Mal says, without a second thought. They deserve to have lunch brought to them, after all. “And fruit, make sure they add that.”

Evie flashes her a little smile. “I’ll tell him you said that. Mal- wants- fruit.”

Mal snorts. “Mal also wants a pony,” she says, “And world domination, if he’s handing things out today.”

“If you tell him she wants a pony, what’ll you bet a horse turns up in the stable tomorrow with her name on it?” Jay asks. 

Evie shakes her head. “No bet! He’s absolutely head-over-heels for her, did you see him last night?”

Her family is the worst sometimes. “Guys—” 

Evie cuts her off. “He likes you, Mal. He really does.”

Ugh. Crushes are stupid and inconvenient and Mal doesn’t need to deal with this. She’s still the leader here, and she doesn’t have to put up with this kind of teasing if she doesn’t want to; one sharp word could make them shut their foolish mouths, but it’s not worth that. “I like you guys,” Mal whines, instead of snapping. “I don’t need another prince to be happy. I… care. About you all.” 

Evie reaches over to grab both of Mal’s hands in her own. “And we care about you! But, Mal, it wouldn’t be the worst thing if you had a prince in addition to us. He could help us out.”

That’s her Evie, always thinking ahead. “How so?” Mal demands. They’re going to get the wand on their own anyway, and even if they decide not to follow through with her mother’s plan once they have it, royal connections aren’t going to matter if they have all the magic in the land under their control. Magic trumps mortals, every time. It won’t matter in a few weeks, what they’ve done or haven’t done about their homework, or their hair, or who they’ve managed to seduce or scam. They’re going to hold the power in their own right, no matter what they choose to do with it in the end. It’ll be theirs, and theirs alone. No more stupid Auradon kids looking down on them, when they’ve got the magic to do whatever they want. 

Evie sighs. “Power? Money? He has connections here that we’re never going to be able to catch up to, no matter who we meet. He can get us in with the Auradon elite, babe. If we do want to—” 

She stops. If they want to do what they’ve talked about, just the two of them, in the quiet space of their room on the nights that they spend alone together. If they want to do the unthinkable, and stay where they are. 

“Well.” Evie says, instead of giving a voice to the thought. “He can help us, that’s all I’m saying. He’s something to think about.”

Mal shakes off the thought of the coming weeks. The choice between following their parent’s wishes, stealing the wand and leaving the princes and princess out to dry, running away and going it on their own, pretending that their parents are really trapped and just going about the new lives that they’ve been offered here...those are decisions for future-Mal to make. Things that can be put off until they need to be dealt with. And hey, usually when she puts things off for long enough, they can be dealt with in fists instead of schemes, which would be immensely more satisfying for her. 

“Right now, all I want to think about is lunch.” Mal says. “When’s our  _ dear  _ Ben getting here, again?”

Evie glances back down at her candy-colored phone, which she’s been flipping absently in her hands. “At least half an hour. He says, ah,” she taps at the screen, nails clicking against the glossy surface. “He’s got work, but he’ll be done before the lunch rush, and he’s bringing us all boxes.”

“Perfect.”

Evie shoots Mal a dazzling smile, because she’s too good for a proper villain-ly smirk. “He kind of is, babe.” she says. “Just think about what he could do for us, okay?” 

Mal is thinking alright. “‘Kay.” she says. “I promise.” 

+++

True to his word, half an hour later, Ben knocks on the door of Mal and Evie’s dorm room. 

Mal hops up off the bed, where she’s been sitting fully dressed and ready to go since Evie got the first text and made them all attempt to look presentable. As presentable as they ever get, anyway. Mal’s still wearing more studs than anyone else in Auradon Prep could get away with. “Benny-boo?” she calls “What’s the magic word?” 

“I brought lunch?” Ben calls back. He sounds---fine. Awake, unbothered. Alive. All of that shit. 

Mal is already going to let him in, so it’s kind of overkill for Evie to yell over her. She’s on top of it, she’s got herself totally under control, and she’s not even thinking too hard about murder today. She’s just here to have a good time with a cute boy, and not do anything stupid like yell at him or try to set him on fire. She’s totally over it, ready to be completely chill about letting a strange beta boy in with her pack while they’re cuddly and vulnerable. 

“That works!” Evie yells at the door, overtop Mal’s totally-not-muder thoughts. “Mal’s letting you in now!” 

“Cool!” Ben yells back. “I brought juice too!” 

Unfortunately, the door opens inwards, so it’s not a very dramatic effect. It’s way more fun to slam open doors when there’s a chance of hitting people. 

“Hey.” Mal says. Neutral. Cool. That’s her. 

“Hi,” Ben says. He’s got a paper bag from the dining hall in one hand, and a tray of cups in the other. He’s wearing a blue shirt half-buttoned over his undershirt, and it’s making his eyes look distractingly bright. “How’re you doing?” 

Mal is totally going to answer him, she is. She’s all over this whole talking-to-people thing. 

Evie, who is sitting perching on the desk that usually serves as her sewing table, leans over so that she can see Ben too. “Let him in, come on!” she calls. “And shut the door behind you.”

Mal moves. Ben scoots. Somehow, nobody drops anything. 

“Hi.” Ben says again, to the room at large. “Uh. Sorry for-- for yesterday.” 

Evie hops off her desk. “Don’t be!” she chirps, coming over to lay her hand on Ben’s arm and give him the full force of her dazzling smile. “We’re glad to see you. What’d you bring for us?” 

Ben shakes his head, like he’d forgotten the bag in his hand just from the sheer force of Evie touching him, which is completely understandable. Mal can relate to that. “Oh, right!” he says “Yeah, I brought food. It’s all the same, uh, each box, so it doesn’t matter which one you get, they’ve got the same stuff. And there’s oranges in the bottom of the bag.” He laughs, short and sweet. “It was that or bananas today, and I know how you guys feel about those, so.” 

Mal snorts. “I just think it’s wrong that you’re only allowed to eat the center here.” she says, even as she’s taking the bag out of Ben’s hands to see for herself. “It’s wasteful, and Fairy Godmother is always telling us that’s something you guys are trying to reduce here.” 

Ben frowns, faintly. Just a little wrinkle between his eyes. Mal totally doesn’t want to smooth it out with her fingers. “Eating banana peels is helping our carbon footprint?” 

What? That sounds extremely made up, so it’s not a lie no matter what Mal says next. She’s allowed to keep playing a game of untruths. “Sure.” she says loftily. “We’re the ones helping you, really. You should be grateful to us.” 

“We should take this valuable opportunity to learn from other cultures instead of only thinking about ourselves?” Ben says with a little smile, like it’s a special joke between the two of them. 

Ah. Dunking on Fairy Godmother’s speeches, now this is a language that Mal understands.

“Exactly.” she says. “You should consider this a valuable opportunity for cross-cultural connection, and take everything you can from this moment. Every moment, really. We’re too valuable not to treasure.” 

Ben ducks his head, but he’s smiling, eyes crinkling up at the edges, all warm and bright. Like Evie’s when she wants to laugh but is trying not to encourage them. “I’ll take it under consideration.” he says seriously. 

“You’d better.” Mal sniffs. “I expect a report next week on the cultural value of waste-not-want-not.” 

“Two-thousand words, double spaced.” Evie chimes in. 

“I’ll get right on that.” Ben promises with a smile. Gods, this boy is cheerful. “Would you like your food now?” 

“Yes.” Mal decides. “We would.” she pauses. It’s probably the right thing to do, here, but just because she knows she should doesn't mean she has to like doing it. “Thank you.” she finishes, without even making a face. 

Ben hands over the cups, as well as a wad of napkins and a handful of plastic utensils from his pockets. “That looked like it hurt.” he says, not without sympathy. 

Mal flashes her fangs at him. “Oh, you think so? I’d like to see you try punching somebody with a broken wrist, then.  _ That _ hurts.” 

Ben laughs. Idiot beta boy. She should be feared, not laughed at. He’s being stupid again, not fearing her like she is meant to be feared.

“Still.” he says lightly. “I appreciate your effort.” 

Mal doesn’t know what to say to that. She’s trying to be nice today, though, so instead of growling, or maybe-possibly giving him a little bite, just a nip, something to make him smell more like her (like them, but she’s not dealing with that just yet) she gives him a blank look and busies herself digging through the bag instead. 

There’s five containers. Four of them, one prince. True to his word, they all feel and smell the same, and when Mal lifts the stack out, there’s oranges rolling around in the bottom. Mal pops one of the containers open just to check what’s inside. 

Huh. Toasted sandwiches, those are familiar. Orange fries, which aren’t. Some kind of green salad stuff, which is probably the kitchen’s attempt at getting the Auradon brats to eat their greens. Even when there’s fresh fruit and vegetables around every day, some of the idiots here don’t eat them, and Mal’s noticed the kitchen putting out more and more green options as the weeks have gone on. If the brats are too stupid to feed themselves, Mal feels that it should be their problem to deal with, instead of the kitchen’s. Still, there’s more for them this way, and she’ll never complain about that. 

She un-stacks the boxes, picking two out of the middle of the pile to give to the boys. Carlos gets his first, because some things are just important like that. He’s better today than yesterday, but he’s still wearing a pair of Mal’s sweatpants with his stolen hoodie, so he’s not back to 100% yet. Jay gets his next, because he’s also sitting on the bed, cross-legged so that he can lean over to see the game screen they’re playing on without blocking the faint sunlight streaming through the stupid gauzy curtains that Mal hasn’t managed to get rid of yet. 

There. It’s a little bit easier to focus now, with half of her pack fed. Potentially fed. Given food, that’s close enough. Mal sets the top box aside for herself, and turns to hand the next-warmest one to Evie. 

“Here. Eves.” she says, handing it over carefully. “This one’s for you.” 

Evie shoots her a look. “Babe--”

Mal glares right back at her princess. Sure, it’s stupid to show their entire dynamic around any Auradon kids, but Ben already saw an awful lot last night, so it’s not like he’s completely unaware. They can probably pull him just fine without hiding everything about themselves, and besides, if Mal doesn’t get to do some of the dumb pack shit that her brain so desperately wants to indulge in, she really will throw somebody out the window and it might not even be the prince. 

Speaking of. Mal shoots a sneaky glance at Ben, who is watching them a little too intently for just another dumb Auradon brat. 

He sees it, because of course he does, and puts his hands up like that’s going to mean anything. “It’s okay.” Ben says quickly, “You don’t have to pretend in front of me.” 

Mal shows her teeth, not growling yet, but not too far from it either. “Pretend what?” 

“That you’re not together.” 

It’s not a good choice, because he obviously already knows, but it’s instinct at this point. Deflect, ridicule, make them regret ever daring to ask. “You think-- us?” Mal says, making a little gesture around at her family. Like it’s the stupidest idea she’s ever heard. “Really?” 

Ben looks at her, steady as ever. “I’m right, aren’t I?” he asks, evenly. “You’re together. All of you. A pack, right?” 

“Why would you--” 

Evie shakes her head, sharply. “Give it up, Mal.” she says. “He knows.” 

Ugh. Mal crosses her arms over her chest, instead of lashing out like she’d like to. “Fine.” she spits. “Yes, we’re a pack. Gonna turn us in, princeling? Kick us out of the school for leading you on?” 

“No!” Ben says, too loud. He realizes, though, and rocks back on his heels almost before Mal realizes that she’s got an arm up in front of Evie. “Not hardly.” he says, much softer this time. “I just wanted to spend time with you guys. If that’s okay.” 

He hesitates. Mal waits. There’s always more, if you can just hang on long enough to hear it. 

Ben makes a nervous little gesture with his hand in his pocket. “We were just talking about cultural exchange, right? I wanna see what you guys are really like when you’re not hiding this. It’s important for you, obviously, and if I’m going to make the VK program the best it can be, I need to know how to make other packs comfortable as well.” 

It’s probably stupid. It’s probably Auradon living making her soft, and weak, and everything her mother would hate to see from her wicked heir. It’s got to be, because there’s no way that Isle Mal, the same girl who once left Ginny Gothel in tears after beating her ass in advanced selfishness, would even consider letting this sweet little Audaron boy into her inner circle. 

“That’s very progressive of you, your highness.” Mal says, instead of breaking right away. 

Ben ducks his head. “I wish it didn’t have to be. I can go, if you’d rather. I don’t want to make any of you uncomfortable if you want to be alone instead.” 

Mal glances around at her pack. Evie, obviously, wants him to stay. She’s too composed to beg, but if she were even a touch more comfortable around this boy, she would be. She’s making big sad eyes at Mal as-is, and she can only imagine what would be going on if Ben weren’t already here in front of them. Her boys, over out of the way, aren’t much better. Jay shrugs when she catches his eye, but he’s awfully relaxed for having a stranger in their space, so he’s probably on board with Ben staying. 

Carlos is still holding his game, but his hands aren’t moving on the buttons, and he’s watching Mal just the same as the others. It’s his call, really. Double votes to the most affected. Mal cocks her head, and he nods. 

“He might as well stay at this point,” Carlos says. “He knows anyway.” 

Oh, for Mother Leto’s sake. She’s too soft with them. “Fine.” Mal says to Ben with barely even an eye roll. “You can stay, princeling, but you’d better keep looking cute or you’ll be out before you can say nepotism.” 

Ben’s mouth goes loose for a moment, but he’s too well-trained to let himself gape for long. “I’ll… try my best?” he says with an awkward little laugh. 

Mal reaches over to pat him on the shoulder, not unfriendly now that they’ve managed to make a real decision. Princeling is in for now, at least until they can figure out what they really want to do with him in the coming weeks. “You’d better.” she says firmly. 

“I will.” Ben promises. “I swear.” 

+++

The weird fries, as it turns out, are made of sweet potatoes. 

Mal thinks that they’re just okay, but Jay eats half of hers in addition to his own pile, so at least somebody is enjoying them. Evie likes the salad stuff, which turns out to be made with cooked squash this time in addition to the greens, which is why they haven’t seen this particular combination before. The squash is just coming into season, and Auradon gets dibs on the best of the harvest, as part of the USA trade agreement with the province of Charmington, as Ben explains to them. It’s also why they haven’t seen it on the isle, because even though they’re a stable vegetable that would hold up well on the barges, they’re also seen as something of a local specialty, and are therefore too good to send to the Isle of the Lost. 

So. That’s kind of shitty. 

Ben got really mad when he was talking about it, though, which was cute. He goes all pink-cheeked when he’s upset, or embarrassed, or mad, and it made Mal want to see how much more she can make him blush. She’s pretty sure the answer is going to be a lot. 

Ben’s waving his hands around again now, and Mal should probably be listening to him, just in case it’s something important enough to pull her out of the comfortable haze she’s in right now of  _ warm-fed-pack-safe-pack.  _

“Why didn’t you--” Ben cuts himself off to run his hands through his hair. He might be feeling it too, actually, the contented vibes of  _ together-safe-together-pack  _ that are happening right now. It’s not a physiological response, all that stuff was debunked ages ago, but a body language thing. Packs being in tune with each other and shit, feeding off of each other’s emotions like crazy when they’re in a period of crazy bonding-hormone hyperarousal. 

But. Ben. That’s who Mal is focusing on. He’s saying stuff. “That’s not what I mean.” Ben says, stopping again. “I’m trying to--I’m asking, not judging here. We didn’t know how to help you guys yesterday, and I understand that you don’t always trust us yet, but-- ugh.” 

Mal cocks her head. She is  _ so  _ listening to him now. Asking about yesterday, that’s actually important stuff. “Mm?” she hums. 

“I understand why you didn’t want to tell us about your orientations.” Ben says seriously. He’s trying so hard. It’s adorable. “I know that it’s hard--” 

“Hah.” 

“That’s it’s  _ difficult  _ to be someone who exists outside of what we consider to be the standard orientations, but what I don’t understand is why you would go so far out of your way to hide this from us.” he says in a rush of words. “ Is it something we’ve done? Have we made you feel unsafe here?” 

Mal snorts.  _ Safe.  _ Everyone is so concerned with keeping them  _ safe,  _ and they don’t think to look at what they’re coming from. Nobody thinks about child safety when they’re building a big ol’ prison island to shove all the awful baddies and  _ interesting  _ folks on, but as soon as you take the kids off of the isle, it’s all about child safety and staying in their own beds at night and not climbing on roofs and shit. 

“ It’s easier to hide who we are than to fight everyone who thinks we shouldn't be this way.” she says, instead of explaining. Not like an Auradon beta boy (who dates  _ princesses,  _ ugh) is going to understand. 

Ben frowns at her. “Why hide at all?” he asks. “I know that the Isle is different, but we don’t discriminate based on orientation here.” 

He pauses. “Um. Anymore. We have laws now! They’ve in your student handbook, the equality laws. All students are protected in their right to an equal education, regardless of orientation, gender, nationality, uh, excetera.” 

In lieu of answering, Mal gestures to the door, which currently has a lovely message scrawled on it in charmed indelible ink. Somebody went to a lot of effort for this message, a particularly un-original rhyme about her mother. The past ones have been scribbled quickly, usually in permanent marker, but somebody went to a lot of effort to procure the ink for this one and despite the best efforts of the cleaning staff, it’s still up. The sharpie messages are usually gone within a day or two, but they keep showing up no matter how many times the cleaning staff stops by. Mal’s been considering keeping a tally, or possibly publishing a review in the school newsletter. Evie’s taken to correcting their grammar, and the boys did a lovely illustration for one of them. The bloodstains were really inspiring. 

Ben’s eyes follow her arm.

“Oh.” 

Mal smiles at him, oh-so-sweetly. “ _ Some _ times,” she says, falling into a cadence that’s uncomfortably like the tone her mother uses when she’s lecturing Mal on the proper way to rule over peons, “When we’re already a target just because of who we are, it’s easier to hide than to challenge every single asshole who thinks we shouldn’t be here.” She takes a breath. “I know that you think the island is some kind of raging cesspit of bigotry, your  _ royal  _ highness, but sometimes, when you send all the wicked lady alphas and pretty male omegas away because they scare your pretty-princess sensibilities, we end up a little more receptive to our outsiders.” 

Mal glances at Ben, but he’s listening silently, just nodding along. 

“When it’s all  _ shit,”  _ she spits, “everyone gets the same load of it no matter what their orientation is. Alpha girls don’t have to pretend to be all submissive for your little princes, and betas aren’t shoehorned into subservience because they don’t have the magic fucking dicks all your princes pretend they need to use so badly. Some of the adults might give us shit for it, but when you’re raised on  _ nothing, princeling,  _ you learn to protect what you do have. My mother runs the isle, and she doesn’t put up with the alpha male bullshit you’ve got here, no matter what your protections say. I am not going to risk my pack’s safety by spilling our business everywhere just because your father signed a piece of paper saying we can all have equal rights.” 

Ben frowns at that “I--” he starts. 

Mal cuts him off. “I’m not done talking.” she says. “The reason,  _ highness,  _ that we hid isn’t because of you. It’s safer to keep our secrets secret because of people like this.” She gestures to the door. “Idiots who think that they’re owed something just for knowing the least important facts about us.” 

Mal raises a hand before Ben can even think about opening his mouth again. “I don’t hide who I am because I won’t be attacked outright for revealing my orientation. People glare at me, but really, they would be doing that anyway. If a few nasty looks is what it takes to keep my crew safe, I’ll take that. I will keep them safe, no matter  _ what  _ the cost. I will not let your ideas of  _ equality on paper  _ get in the way of my plans for my family, and if you think I should be punished for lying about this, I want you to think, highness, for one moment, what it’s like for people who aren’t you.” 

Ben is oh-so-clearly begging to speak again, so Mal shuts up for a moment to let him have at it. 

“Your orientations don’t have to be public!” Ben says quickly, seizing his opportunity. “If you’d told Fairy Godmother beforehand, she could have--” 

Mal cuts him off with a wicked laugh. Cackling and shrieking, the sixth grade finals for Style In Villany class, were the only finals that she’s ever aced in her life. 

“What, you think we should tell the most powerful adult in this school who we are? The one with the power to throw us right back where we came from if we refuse her anything she asks for?” Mal shrieks. She sounds unhinged, and knows it. “What do you think would happen if she decided to tell another, less  _ good  _ teacher about us? If it somehow got out that we were refusing to follow a teacher’s orders? What do you think would happen then,  _ princeling?”  _

Ben swallows. He looks pasty, approaching a lovely shade of pale green. “I’m sorry.” he chokes out. “I am so sorry.” 

What. 

Mal pulls back from the whole wicked fairy routine. “What?” she asks. 

“Mal. Guys. I’m sorry that this happened to you. I’m sorry that we didn’t make it clear enough  _ from the beginning  _ that you never, ever have to do what an adult asks of you if it’s something-- something awful. We have rules in place to protect students, and that includes you guys too.” 

Ben looks really genuinely upset. He’s tripping over his words, and not in a funny way. It’s like-- 

No. Anything that Mal says is going to be written off. Good guys don’t believe it when the villains have a change of heart, and so Ben isn’t really going to believe anything that Mal tells him. She can’t trust this. It’s a good act, but it’s got to be just an act. Some kind of royal ploy, trying to get on their better side before they-- 

Before they do something awful like steal Fairy Godmother’s magic wand and release their parents and every other villain trapped on the Isle on unsuspecting people. 

“You don’t owe anybody here a thing, and we aren’t going to send any of you back to the isle just because you tell us ‘no’ or make a mistake, okay? I’m sorry that we didn’t notice-” Ben gestures, helplessly, back at the door, “--what people have been saying to you guys. I was too caught up in the actual mechanics of bringing you guys over to see what’s been going on since you’ve been here. And--” 

Ben stops. He looks incredibly uncomfortable, and it makes the evil part of Mal squirm happily in her chest. The other parts of her don’t feel quite so satisfied, but she pushes them down. They aren’t helping her anyway. 

“If any teachers have ever asked you to-- to do anything that you don’t feel comfortable doing-- you should bring it to me. And I can. Help. I’m not an adult, so I don’t have to tell Fairy Godmother like the teachers do, and I can help you figure things out, if it’s something that should be brought to her or-- or not. If you want.” 

Mal nods, sharp. “We would appreciate that.” she says. 

Ben still looks uncomfortable, bordering on physically ill. He should maybe get that checked out. “Has anyone-- students or teachers-- done anything?” he asks. “Tried anything that I should know about?”

Don’t look at Evie. Don’t look at Evie. Don’t-- 

Mal sneaks a glance over at Evie. She’s sitting pretty, of course, because when you’ve been raised to be a princess, a little thing like princes admitting to stalking you around the castle isn’t worth bothering anyone about. She’s more than capable of dealing with them on her own, her little stalker posse, but maybe they should say something, see if they can get some institutional hell rained down on the morons who’ve been bugging her. It would build trust in them, probably--

“Gorra’s a creep.” Carlos says, apropos of  _ absolutely nothing.  _ “He offers ‘extra credit’ if you stay after class with him.” 

Ben nods. “I’ll talk to someone,” he says. He's talking real soft, like that’s going to make any difference after getting Mal all worked up and shouty a minute ago. “I’ll get him checked out.” 

Carlos shrugs. He’s already fidgeting with his phone, clearly ready to be done talking about this. “Yeah.” he says. “That'd be cool.” 

Ben whips his own phone out and actually makes a note, like he’s really going to do this. “Anyone else?” he asks, looking earnestly around at the rest of them, like they’re all just hiding secrets about creepy fucking pre-calc teachers. “If any of the guys have been doing anything, I can get them investigated. We had, my first year here, this complaint box? It was anonymous, but the teachers took it pretty seriously. I could get it opened up again. Giving anyone shit because of their orientation isn’t okay.” 

“Hah!” 

Mal cocks her head. “You know, highness, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you swear before.” 

Ben freezes, like a lizard caught under a torch light. “Oh. Well. I’m allowed.” he says slowly. “I just-- I try not to, you know? Can’t do it in council meetings, so I try not to make it a habit.” 

It’s so, so tempting to believe his cute little act. Practicing his whole life to be a good little king, hanging out with them even after he knows that they’re a pack, and he’s going to have to win all of them if he wants any of them, trying to promise them a place to report every creep in the school who makes an untoward comment about Mal’s junk. It’s so tempting to buy in, to believe that there’s some magic way for this little princeling to sweep in and fix everything. 

Mal is so tired. 

“I like you this way.” Mal admits out loud. She’s not lying. Ben really is cute, all fired up about injustice and ready to swear on their behalf. It’s confusing, but still cute, in a very do-gooder kind of way. “All fired up and angry about injustice. It’s cute.” 

“You should come to council with me!” Ben exclaims. “You could tell them about this firsthand. It would be even better if I had one of you with me when I speak about reforms. You could share your side of things!” 

If only Mal didn’t hate organized meetings with every fiber of her being, it would be such a tempting offer. Spend time pissing off adults, making nice with Ben, and maybe even furthering their own goals without bloodshed. It really would be a sweet gig, if Mal could make it through without snapping and beginning the bloodshed herself. Luckily, before she can talk herself into something that she’s never going to be able to manage, Evie sweeps in to save her. 

“Mal isn’t much for sitting still,” Evie says, smiling brightly, “but if you ever want the villain perspective, I’d be happy to come with you.” 

Ben turns to her. “Really?” he asks. 

Mal resists the urge to bash somebody’s head into the wall. Probably her own, if she’s being honest. Evie would be a perfect addition to any meeting that relies on making nice with rich idiots who want to feel powerful by playing with other people’s lives. Evie is great at smiling and looking pretty and pumping men and other women-inclined types for information without ever giving away that she’s doing so. She would kick butt in a council meeting, is what Mal’s thinking. And, well. Getting Evie a lead not just with the prince, but with the entire governing council as well, that’s something worth doing, even if they do decide to go with their parent’s plan in the end. 

“Of course!” Evie is saying. “I’d  _ love _ to get involved.” 

Ben, at least, is smart enough to recognize when he’s getting in over his head. “You’re going to rip us apart, aren’t you?” he asks her with a little laugh, like it’s just so funny for him. He’s bringing one of the villain kids into his country’s ruling circle, and he’s laughing about it. Mal can’t figure out if he’s an idiot, or if he really is this trusting of their ability to change for  _ good,  _ based on a month of lessons. It’d be simpler to believe that he’s an idiot. Easier, certainly. The coddled little rich boy, left in his golden bubble, unable to conceive of the idea that there are people out there, people who he’s brought into his school, who might mean him harm. 

It’s easier to believe this. Easier to think that the Auradon brats are just that, over trusting children who wouldn’t be able to function without the leadership of their parents, the last generation who knew what it was like to have villains and  _ interesting  _ folk in the world. 

It would be so easy. 

Evie smiles at Ben, putting all of her perfect teeth on display. “Yes.” she admits. 

The golden prince grins back at her. Trusting, yes, but maybe not for all the wrong reasons. Maybe not so like his father after all. 

“I can’t wait to see you in action.” Ben says, and oh, baby. 

Mal can’t wait either. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit of an interlude scene-- it comes directly after the fic I haven’t written yet, which would cover the events of the first canon Descendants movie. Almost everything I changed can be picked up on through context clues, but see the end notes for more details of what went on in between if you’re confused! 
> 
> No warnings that I can think of for this chapter. I am briefly Not Kind to Doug, but Evie deserves better than him anyway and I have no regrets.

Mal dances up to Ben, on the neon-lit steps of the castle. “Hey, princeling,” she says with a little smirk and a swish of her soft purple skirts. “Wanna take a spin?” 

Ben grabs on to her outstretched hand. “You know it.” he says, and lets her pull him out onto the dance floor. 

Mal, shockingly, isn’t a bad dancer. She’s not letting Ben lead very well, but it’s kind of fun to let go, and just let himself be pulled along with the music and the movement of her body, rather than trying to hold himself back with the formal steps that have been drilled into him through years of royalty-appropriate dance lessons designed to teach him just the right way to lead a lady or omega with whom he is interested in dancing. 

It’s fun, is what Ben’s thinking. Mal must be able to feel him relax into it, because she swings him a little harder, pushing Ben into moving away and back from her again, a little swing-steppy sort of move that doesn’t really fit with the upbeat song currently pumping through the outdoor speakers that the castle keeps around for just this kinds of student event. 

She pulls him in, so that they’re shoulder to shoulder again, and bounces a bit on her heels to bring her face up to Ben’s cheek. “So, hey!” Mal whisper-shouts in Ben’s ear. “You looked pretty good up there today! Very regal, and all that.” 

Ben draws her over to the edge of the crowd before answering. It’s quieter, on the far side of the dance floor. Further away from the speakers. 

“Thanks?” he says. Is this what flirting looks like? “You looked good, too.” Oh, wait. “Very  _ good _ .” he adds, with a little nudge to her shoulder. 

Mal crows out a burst of laughter, and slaps Ben on the arm. “Oh my gods, Ben! You’re awful, you know that?” 

This is more like it. Ben knows what to do with this. It’s kind of hard to reign in his grin. “Usually people tell me I’m good.” he says, pushing close. 

Mal lets him get all up in her personal space, grinning like a jack-o-lantern all the while. “You know what I meant. You were pretty cool today, princeling.” 

“Shouldn’t you be calling me kingling now?” Ben asks, reaching up to touch the crown he’s swapped into for the party. Tradition dictates that he’s not allowed to wear the ceremonial crown for casual events, but his sense of self-importance, which he  _ knows  _ is something he should be working on, means he’s wearing the casual, plated one that was offered after the main coronation ceremony ended. “King of the states, and all.” 

“Mm,” Mal hums. “I don’t know if a double vote at council meetings and increasing responsibilities until age twenty-five or marriage is really enough for me to consider you a king quite yet.” She swings Ben around into a little spin, both of them ducking under each other’s arms, equal partners on the edge of the neon dance floor. “Get back to me in a bit,” she shouts over the rush of noise as a new, apparently very popular song comes on. “I’ll have to consider it.” 

Ben spins her swing-dance style, so that she ends up with her arms crossed, tucked against his chest as he leans them both over. “That’s more than fair,” he says, burying it in the curve of her jaw, by her ear. “I don’t know if I should consider myself a king yet either, then. There’s no official re-coronation date chosen yet, so maybe I’ll have to wait for my second crowning.” 

Mal pulls back at that, far enough so that she can look Ben in the face. “Is there going to be one?” She sounds horrified. “That’s terrible.” 

Ben laughs. “You know us royals. Always gotta be the center of attention, right?” 

“Mm-hm'' Mal hums. She seems distracted, and it takes Ben a moment to notice her staring behind him, back out on the main floor. She looks back as soon as she realizes that he’s realized, but not before he catches a glance of blue. She’s watching Evie, of course, as she goes sweeping by all glittering and beautiful on the arm of a boy whom Ben knows Mal hates. 

Ben doesn’t have anything against Doug, personally, but it makes sense that Mal would resent any boy, even a band-geeky one, making eyes at her girlfriend. 

He dares to move a hand to the small of Mal’s back, pulling her in. She doesn’t startle, of course, but she looks back to him. 

“Um,” Mal laughs. “Oops. Us villains too, we just live for the drama of it all.” 

“I’m sure. Would you ever want to be crowned, if you could go back to the moors someday?” 

The corner of Mal’s mouth twitches, like she’s trying not to smile (Or maybe not to bare her teeth at him. It’s hard to say sometimes, with Mal.) “It wouldn’t quite be going back, for me. I’ve never been in the first place.” 

Ben ducks his head. He’s a little bit lightheaded from the drinks served earlier, and a little bit flustered from being around this amazing girl. “Right,” he says. “Of course.” 

“Anyway, no. I wouldn’t want to be crowned the queen of a people I’ve never even met.” Mal goes on. “I know my mother wanted me to reclaim our homeland, and all that, but I’m not really much for….” 

“Subjugating unwilling people under your iron fist?” Ben offers. The chunks of iron sewn into the outside of Mal’s gloves are something he’s been too afraid to ask about directly. Maybe after tonight, he’ll find the right words. 

“Not quite iron.” Mal says lightly, making a fist to demonstrate. She’s right. She’s wearing a delicate golden bracelet today, draping down over the back of her hand. No iron in sight. “My golden fist?” 

He has to have seen her bare hands before this. It’s basically impossible for him to have not seen. She can’t possibly wear gloves all of the time. “Doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does it.” Ben manages to say. 

He wants to hold her hand. 

Mal pulls her fist back before he can make a move. “Not quite, no.” 

“Anyway. That’s a no on ruling a kingdom?” 

She laughs again. “The moors isn’t really a kingdom, Audaron boy. It’s a few swamps, a couple farmers, and a few hundred abandoned fairy dwellings. Most of the people who lived there, even before the Auradonians came in and changed everything, were already moving away to the prettier parts of fairey. Deep woods, the meadows. It’s barely a town anymore, is what my mother said, and she’d know.” 

Oh. Right. He should have known that. “Still. I’m glad you chose to stay here.” 

“Me too.” Mal says. “I am  _ not  _ ready to rule a kingdom yet, even if it is just a tiny fairy town bordering on Auradonian farmlands.” 

Something about the sentence pings in Ben’s mind as  _ wrong,  _ but he’s too distracted to think about it now. It’ll come up again later, probably. He’s trying to work on being encouraging and sweet to the villain kids, after the whole family day debacle and what happened yesterday. If it’s really important, it’ll come up again. “I’m glad you chose our side.” Ben tells her, instead of pushing. “You’re not like your mother, and I  _ know _ , I know you have a lot of things to say about her, and I want to hear them, but can I just tell you how proud of you all I am, just for a minute?” 

Mal shuts her mouth. Score one for Ben, stopping a nasty comment before it can even come out. “I suppose I could stand being praised,” she says loftily. She’s so clearly channeling somebody else that it nearly sends Ben into giggles. “so long as it’s only for a minute.” 

He stifles them. “Thank you, your future queen-ness.” 

“You’re welcome, future-kingling.” Mal says, raising an eyebrow as if to indicate that Ben should get on with singing her praises, already, and quit beating around the bush. 

Well then. 

“I’m so proud of you, Mal. All of you guys, Evie and Jay and Carlos too, but especially you. You’re the leader, and you did a really hard thing yesterday, and it really meant a lot that you guys trusted me enough to come forward about what your mother was planning, even though you didn’t know how we would react.” Ben sucks in a breath. “I know it’s been a hard adjustment, with, you know, your pack situation and everything, but I am so happy every time I see you guys, and I’m really grateful that you let me be your king tonight.” 

“Wow.” 

He wants to make sure she knows this. It’s super important, all of a sudden. “I really like you guys.” he tells her. “Just, like, as people. Cause you’re cool, and not cause you’re my project kids or because I’m under your thrall or whatever else the rumor mill has been saying about us. I like you guys because you’re really cool people, and you clearly care a lot about each other, and about the other kids on the isle, too, and I want to help you do the right thing, not just for you guys, but for them too.” 

She’s still letting him talk. Shit, he didn’t think he was going to get this far. “I know I’m not really the ruling king, not yet,” he goes on, “but I promise you that I am going to do my best with the power that has been trusted in me to do everything I can to help the other kids on the Isle, and not just my people who act like me. I don’t know exactly how I’m going to do it just yet, but Evie’s already promised that she’s going to come to council meetings with me, and I hope that maybe someday you guys will consider the same. You’ve taught me a lot about what I don’t know yet, as a king, and I want you guys by my side as I’m learning how to do this thing. I think you’re incredible, okay?”

She’s staring. Oh, my god, she’s just staring at him. “I love you.” Ben finishes, breathless. 

Mal’s mouth is actually hanging open. That’s probably not good. Maybe it’s good. Ben doesn’t know. He can feel his heart beating in his face, he’s so nervous. He’s probably sweaty, too, and it’s way too late to try and drop her hand to fix it. 

“Um--” Ben starts, and that, of all things, seems to jerk Mal back into motion. 

“Oh my gods,” she says, and maybe she’s a little bit flushed? Did Ben do that? “Did you just come up with that on the spot like this?” 

Ben’s flushed, that’s for sure. He’s a blusher, always has been. “I might have put a little bit of thought into some of it.” he admits. 

Mal seems to be recovering just fine, based on the way she steps in to loop her arms over his shoulders. “Just a little?” she whispers, close to his ear. 

Ben wants to laugh, but he doesn’t want to whack Mal in the face if he moves too much. Leaning back, that’s okay. It’s just to get the nervous giggles out of his system. “I’ve literally been trained to speak in front of people since I was a kid!” Ben manages, before he has to give up and break and lean back to make sure he isn’t snorting unattractively right into her face. “Give me a break.” 

Mal stays silent, smirking up at him. Oh, right, hah. A break. 

Okay, he doesn’t know what to say. 

“So!” he tries. God, it would be so weird to just swing her back into the circle of people dancing now. “Um, yeah. That’s what I wanted to say. You can go back to teasing me now.” 

Mal tilts her head. “Teasing?” she says “That’s what you think I was doing?” 

“Uh. Yeah? Was it not?” 

“Ben!” she cries. “ That’s flirting! I’ve been flirting with you since you came to our room with that hot chocolate, ages ago!” 

“What!” 

“I didn’t really mean it at first, but I’ve been flirting with you for real since family day! You listened to us when we told you about what our parents were doing, and you didn’t brush us off or tell us that we’re all crazy children who don’t know what we’re doing with ourselves. Ben, we like you too! We wouldn’t tell just anybody about our parents, you know.” 

Ben’s pretty sure his heart is going to explode. It’ll be gross, but at least he’ll die happy. It’ll be worth it, if he can somehow manage to not mess this up and drive away this amazing, brilliant girl who he likes  _ so much,  _ who apparently likes him back, who’s liked him back for a while, and doesn’t even care if he’s not a perfect royal heir all the time. She’s so cool. 

“Really?” Ben asks. Hopefully the goofy smile he can feel spreading across his face makes it clear that he’s only teasing. “And here I was, thinking that you’re the most trusting girl in school.” 

Mal smacks his shoulder, but gently, which for her means that Ben just barely manages to catch himself before he staggers back a step. 

“I’m trying to help us have a moment here!” she says, but she’s smiling too. “Let me get the others, they’ll tell you better than I ever could. Um, where--Evie!” Mal shouts, slightly too loud for the outdoor space. “Eves! Get over here.” 

Evie appears from the floor like magic, slipping into her place at Mal’s side like she was always supposed to be there. Maybe she is. Ben doesn’t pretend to understand magic, and as far as he knows, it’s totally possible to carve out a space perpetually reserved for one person. 

“Mal, babe,” Evie is saying “you can’t just shout me down all the time. Sometimes, there’s this thing called decorum. I think maybe Fairy Godmother’s been trying to teach us about it? For like, a few weeks now?” 

“Ben loves us.” Mal announces, in lieu of a proper answer. “He said just now.” 

Evie gasps. “Oh, Benny-Boo!” she says, turning to Ben and cupping his face in her hands. “We love you too, babe.” 

She has glitter dusting her cheeks, faint and shimmering in the colored lights. Her eyelashes are very long and dark, and she smells really, really good. 

Ben lets his hands rest carefully on Evie’s narrow waist. She’s warm, a little sweaty. She’s been dancing for a while then. 

“Can I kiss you?” he asks, desperately “Both of you?” 

“Ooh, babe.” Evie says, pulling back a little. “Maybe it’s not the best idea to kiss both of us in public?” 

Ben knows this. He does. Really. He’s been making good decisions for sixteen years now, and he knows that kissing two of the children of the worst villains the Isle has to offer in front of most of the Auradon Prep student body isn’t the best choice he could make. 

He really, really wants to kiss them. 

“I’m the king?” he tries. “I can do whatever I want?” He even tilts his head hopefully, which Audrey used to say made him look like he had water stuck in his ear. Whatever. It feels right, putting himself in the perfect place for them to kiss. 

Evie, at least, seems convinced. She’s the one to bridge the space between them, leaning in to press a kiss to one corner of Ben’s lips, and then the other. 

“Point-- mm.” she says, pressing one last kiss to his mouth before pulling back. “Point taken. Kiss away, babe.” 

Oh, he wants to. He wants to keep kissing these girls forever, but Evie is pulling away now, and he’s not supposed to chase a lady, even one who started it. 

Mal leans in instead, quick and sweet and sharper than Evie. Literally, sharper. She cups Ben’s face in her hands as she leans in, which is good, because she titles his head just right for her to reach, and opens her mouth into it, pulling Ben down and nipping at his lower lip with her sharp teeth (does she have dragon’s teeth even in human shape, Ben wonders?) and pulling away before he can fully return the sentiment.

“Ah--?” Ben manages to gasp, confused but really, really not displeased about this turn of events, and then Mal is pulling back too, following Evie, somewhere off in the shadows under the balcony, where the lights don’t quite reach. 

She shoots him a smile before she goes, though, and her teeth are sharper than they have any real right to be, so that’s one question answered at least. “We’ll talk later!” she calls, even as she’s reaching out for Evie’s hand, letting herself be pulled along through the glittering tide. 

Ben doesn't quite know what to say to that. “Sure.” he tries. “Yeah. Sure thing.” 

“Oh--” Mal drops Evie’s hand before she can get more than a step or two away, and darts back to Ben’s side again. “Just for now. Let me leave this with you--” she pulls him down again, and oh, it’s even sweeter this time. “and I’m going to steal back my girlfriend for a moment. Catch you soon, alright Ben?” 

Catch you soon. That’s good, it’s got to be. Somebody looking to kiss and tell wouldn’t say that, probably. Mal wouldn’t say something that she doesn’t mean, and if she’s going to come back and kiss him again even though Evie is right there, that’s got to mean something. 

“Alright.” Ben manages, through the dumb chorus in his head that’s just chanting  _ kiss kiss kiss  _ over and over. “Yeah. See you soon!” 

Mal throws one last wave over her shoulder before she rushes off to catch Evie. They’re always going to mean more to each other than any Auradon boy can even hope to reach, but she’s going to find him again. Maybe, if he’s lucky, he’ll get to see both of them again before the night is done. 

Oh,  _ hell  _ yeah. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the fic I haven’t written yet, Ben is never put under a love spell. Instead, the VKs were planning to use a nastier spell to make Jane or Audrey get the wand for them, because nobody’s going to notice a couple of girls acting really weird, while they would FOR SURE notice if the prince started acting differently right before the coronation. 
> 
> Instead of going through with it, they decided that actually they like living in Auradon and not being like, afraid all the time?? It’s in their own self-interests to stay here as-is without opening up the barrier and bringing in chaos?? And like, probably if they tell Ben about this before they actually do any of the Bad Things they were planning, he’ll help them figure out a solution that doesn’t involve being murdered by their parents if they do escape anyway?? 
> 
> So they do that, and then there’s a planned confrontation with Maleficent that happens BEFORE the coronation, and it all goes according to plan and they turn her into a lizard with the power of love and Ben gets to have a normal coronation without any unplanned dragons, and he’s super proud of these kids for choosing good even though their lives were never in danger (it was 100% in their own self-interests and they still might cause fun and interesting evil problems later on, they’re still deciding), and that’s about where this picks up!!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end of the second section is here!! No new warnings that I can think of, just some kids talking about relationships and doing some smoochin.

For all that Ben is the new king-in-progress of the United States of Auradon, he’s not actually that interesting to most of the students at Auradon Prep. Sure, the party tonight is mostly because of him and the whole coronation business, but after a round of congratulations from the student body at large, and a round of dancing with his friends, he’s pretty much free to wander through the crowd of students as easily as any other member of the royal junior class. 

So. Ben is taking a minute. He’s done an awful lot of glad-handing today, and he’s allowed to have a moment to himself, to just sit by the fountain and watch the lights change while he swirls what’s left of his drink around in the tiny fancy cups that got brought out for this whole shebang. 

Somebody (it was Ezio. They all know it was Ezio. He’s one of the tourney set, and he’s just daring enough to think that he can get away with anything) spiked one of the punch bowls about an hour into the night, and Ben’s been drinking half-and-half for a while now. Some of the other students have been working from pocket or purse flasks for longer, Ben’s sure, but he doesn’t actually like getting drunk. Just a little bit of a bite is enough for him, something to keep him a little bit warm, maybe a tiny bit bolder than he’d be otherwise. 

The thing is-- 

_ The thing is, Ben’s more like his dad than he wants to be.  _

It comes out when his inhibitions are down. When he’s tired, when he’s drunk. He’s been trying, since the first time that he got so mad, as a kid, that he threw one of his mother’s glass figures (the glass figures that granddad makes, that sometimes have things like wires and gears and flowers suspended inside them, that are works of art in their own right and he could sell for a small fortune, if they ever needed another one, but he keeps giving away because he believes that art is something to be shared not sold), to keep it in. Stop the mind-numbing anger that races through his body when he gets  _ mad,  _ to keep the beast that lives in his heart inside. His teachers have called him  _ kind,  _ and  _ steady,  _ a good peacemaker in the classroom, but Ben knows that those aren’t things that come naturally to him, they’re things he works at because he’s got to, because he’s  _ not  _ like other students, and inside he’s somebody who is always going to have something other about him, and that something means he needs to stay in control, to keep from smashing something that’s harder to replace than a glass figure. 

Ben sets down his cup, deliberately. He’s just on the edge of the lights from the party, and the edge of the stone bench he’s on is fading into the dark. He’s pretty sure he’s had enough for tonight. 

Somebody slides out of the dark. 

“Hey, kingling.” the shadow says, resolving itself into Mal. Of course it’s Mal. Even dressed in a shade of purple so pale it’s practically white, she’s good at blending in with the shadows. 

Ben scoots over, letting her slip onto the bench next to him. “I get to be a kingling now?” he asks, teasing. It’s no use trying to be sad around Mal. She’ll steamroll over anything he’s got to say with some argument about how her crew is turning out pretty okay despite their parents, and if they can do it, then Ben’s got nothing to worry about. They haven’t really talked about it yet, but Ben’s starting to pick up the thread of how Mal argues things, and he’s pretty sure he’s got the gist of what she would say if he tries to stay mopey tonight. 

“I’ve thought about it.” Mal says, very seriously. It’s possible that she has also discovered the punch bowl since they last talked. “You can be kingling for now. Until you mess something up.” 

Ben has to laugh at that. It feels a little bitter, but Mal will understand. “Not very long then,” he admits. “I make mistakes all the time.” 

Mal snorts. “You’re telling me. I’ll see you in the common room at curfew tonight?” 

“Alright. Not before?” 

Mal flashes her fangs at him. “I chose good, not  _ boring _ .” she says “Midnight on the dot, take it or leave it.” 

Ben is taking it. He’s allowed. A leniency, for the king. “It’s a date.” he tells her. 

Mal shoots him one of her clever smiles. “Come alone!” she calls sweetly. She’s back on her feet before Ben can think to say anything else, and melted fully back into the shadows before he can get the words out. 

“Will--- do?” Ben calls after her anyway. 

This  _ girl.  _

+++

Ben slips into the common room at five minutes past midnight. He can hear voices, murmuring quietly in the large space, but he can’t quite tell where they’re coming from in the dark. It’s just chilly enough that somebody started a fire earlier in the night, but late enough now that it’s burned down to almost nothing, and the faint glow makes it almost harder for Ben to see anything. Fire dazzle, or something like that. 

“--not coming?” 

Ben follows the sound, moving slowly. He’s barely in the room, so it’s difficult to hear. 

“His-- -- -- -- missing---” 

That  _ sounds  _ like Jay, maybe? 

“ -- -- cool too.” 

“Hello?” Ben calls out. As much as he doesn’t want to be caught out after hours, he’s going to trip over one of the low chairs if he keeps moving. 

The talking stops, and then-- “Ben!” someone exclaims. 

Evie? It sounds like Evie. 

Movement. Somebody is coming up on his left and then--oh, that’s a light. A phone screen, not enough to illuminate the user’s face, but enough for Ben to see that hey, yeah, this is where he’s supposed to be. The light moves closer, and then oh, that’s Mal for sure. 

“Hey there, princey.” Mal says, using Ben’s arm to pull herself up far enough to press a kiss to his cheek. “We thought you chickened out on us.” 

“Nope. Just got caught up for a minute. Sorry I’m late.” 

Mal waves a hand. It’s the one with the light in it, so Ben can track the gesture, at least. He’d like to be able to see her face too, but he can’t get everything he wants. Even if he doesn’t get anything else out of this encounter, he's already learned that spending time with Mal’s crew is nothing if not an exercise in not getting what he wants. 

“All in a bad day’s work, am I right?” Mal says lightly. “You had a lot to do tonight, little kingling. People to see, things to do, the whole… shebang.” 

“Um. Yeah.” Ben says, wrong-footed already. He didn’t mean to get caught up by Chad and some of his friends on the way back to his room, and he  _ really  _ didn’t mean to come here late. It feels a little too much like when he was a kid, and his parents promised to be home in time to eat dinner with him, and then they got caught up in state business and he had to eat in the nursery instead. Not like they didn’t care, but that they’d thought about the best thing to do, and decided that Ben wasn’t so important after all. Ben doesn’t want to be like that. He doesn’t want to start every meeting off with an apology, even though he maybe should. 

Maybe honesty can work instead.

“I’d rather be with you guys,” Ben says quietly. “You’re a lot more fun than state dinners and meeting royals who just want to tell me how much I’ve grown up since they last saw me.” 

One of the shadows leaning against the wall snorts. “Must be nice, being upset about growing too much.” Carlos says, mostly under his breath. 

Someone laughs. It’s not exactly a nice sound. 

Ben fumbles for his phone. If he’s going to be mocked, he’s at least going to see clearly while they’re doing it. 

“Hey, it’s not so fun being around adults who can only remember when you were a child.” Ben says lightly. His phone is in his hand now, but also, he remembers what it felt like to be ignored as a child. Told, not through words, but through action, that you are not important to somebody you can’t help but love. Maybe he deserves a little bit of meanness. “You try talking to old men who want to think that you’re twelve all day long.” he finishes, somewhat lamely. 

The smaller shadow steps forward, and angles their own phone screen up, so that Ben can see Carlos staring at him, intent but not glaring. “I do that literally every day. You try being the size of a middle schooler, man.” 

“Travel sized!” Mal cuts in. “We’re travel size.” 

“You’re shorter than me!” 

“And I could still beat you up, punk.” Mal waves a fist. “Whaddya gonna do about it?” 

Carlos sighs, dramatically. 

Mal grins, clearly pleased with herself. “Anyway, Benny-boy” she says. “do you want to come with us? There’s this beautiful little place called the back room, and once the hall monitor’s done a sweep they never check back there.” 

Ben wants to come with them. He wants to follow Mal anywhere, and the back room is an easy request. She could send him running along behind her all the way back to the isle, for all he cares, as long as he gets to be included. “Yeah.” Ben says out loud. “Yes. Let’s go.” 

Mal fucking  _ cackles.  _ “Follow me, kingling!” she calls, already leading the way. 

Ben falls into line behind her. Not directly behind her, obviously, because that’s where Evie goes, but after her. In the middle, with Mal’s boys taking up the back. A pack sandwich. 

It’s not a very long walk. The back room is just off the main common room, after all. It’s a pretty small space, but it’s got the better couch, and a stack of the better trashy thriller novels that people keep sneaking in, and it’s not directly off the main hallway like the common room is, so Mal’s right, it is a good place to have a secret late-night talk. 

God, Ben hopes that she hasn’t been having too many secret talks with other Auradon kids. One round of plotting to take over the kingdom was more than enough. Ben is already in a fragile position as the new king-in-training, and he doesn’t need to deal with attempted coups in addition to trying to wrangle the council and finish high school at the same time. 

The point is, Mal leads them all to settle in the back room, the one that used to be called the Courting Room before the school decided that it was too outdated of a name to keep. Not when formal courting had been out of style for a few generations, and was starting to fall dangerously close to what the older set considered to be pack behavior. Giving young omegas and betas the chance to meet eligible alphas in the supervised environment of the courting room, Ben knows from his history lessons, was technically couple behavior as well as pack, but even before the push for dynamic independence happened, formal supervised courting behaviors were already falling out of fashion. 

It’s the back common room now, where people go if they want to hang out with a group of their friends and not commit to one person’s room. It’s a social thing, who can get to the back room and claim it for their friends first. It’s caused more than a few fights among the student body, actually, especially when the cliques in residence did really idiotic things, like cover both the doors in shaving cream in a misguided attempt to keep other groups out. 

Ben maintains that  _ someone  _ should’ve thought that one through a little more. 

Anyway. Maybe that’s why the VKs chose it. Someplace they can lay claim to, and not have to worry about sharing with anyone outside their pack. It’s probably a more familiar process than the regular common room rules, which have a lot of clauses about sharing resources and not hoarding the best games and chairs for your friends. 

Ben doesn’t mean to accidentally lock himself into a staredown with Mal. It just happens, all on it’s own. He doesn’t know what to say, exactly, and if he waits, Mal will almost always figure out a way to take the reins. They’ve been spending a lot of time together these past couple of weeks, and Ben likes to think that he’s gotten to be pretty good at reading Mal. Even when she’s mad, she’s always up to poke fun at him, and it’s  _ fun  _ to let her start and then counter whatever ridiculous thing she’s chosen to go on about today with a ridiculous thing of his own, and even when they talk about serious stuff, plots to overthrow his kingdom, or how they would theoretically poison somebody, it can get really intense, but it’s still fun. Talking to Mal is always fun. 

Mal breaks first. “So.” she says, bringing her hands together like she’s going to clap. She stops just before they make contact, and steeples her fingers together instead. “Do you like us?” 

“I like you a lot.” Ben says, earnestly. He really doesn’t want to mess this up. 

Luckily, Mal laughs. “No, kingling.” she says. “Not me. All of us. We’re kind of a package deal. Four-for-one. Buy two-get-two. Big sale on idiots today, you know?” 

“Like a pack.” Ben says, solid and sure. Maybe a little bit teasing. They’ve talked about this with him already, but not enough for him to really know, exactly, what he’s getting into.

Mal’s eyes flash green, just fast enough that Ben’s not entirely sure that it happened at all. 

“Yes.” she says. “Like a pack.” 

Oh. Just like, then. Nothing to worry about. Ben takes in a deep breath, steadying himself. No big deal, just a little casual collusion with some kids who, up until a week ago, were plotting to potentially overthrow the country that he’s just pledged to serve. Nothing wrong with that. Just some teenagers being teenagers, making great dating choices that aren’t potentially life-altering for an entire nation of people. 

Ben breathes out. “Are you asking me if I want to join your pack?” he asks, as cool as he can. No freaking out here, no-siree. 

Mal cocks her head, watching him. There are four sets of eyes on him, actually, and that’s not nerve-wracking at all. “We’re asking if you’re interested.” she says. “No pressure.” 

Oh, god. “Yes.” Ben says, as fast as he can, before he can overthink it. Of course he wants to date these beautiful, brilliant people. “I like you. All of you. You’re like, the coolest people I’ve ever met, and this past week planning with you guys was maybe the most fun I’ve had,  _ ever.  _ I want this.” 

The corner of Mal’s mouth twitches. She’s wearing lipstick tonight, and it’s smudged at the edges. Maybe it’s from where Ben kissed her last time. He hopes so. 

“Cool.” Mal says, and that’s a full-mouth twitch, not just a little corner now. She’s almost smiling. “We want you too. For real, this time. Not just because you’re useful to us.” 

Ben can feel the color flooding to his face. God, he’s so gone on them all. “You said, yeah.” he manages. “Earlier. Y’know.” 

Mal’s face crumples up, but it’s like when she tasted caramel for the first time, not like when she’s really upset about something. “Oh fuck, I did.” she says. “Gross.” 

“Feelings aren’t gross!” Evie bursts out, looking scandalized at the very thought of ignoring her feelings. Jay, who is leaning on the back of her chair, laughs.

“I don’t know what you’ve been having, Eves.” he says. “Feelings are disgusting.” 

“Right??” Mal agrees. “I told Ben that I’ve been flirting for real for the past week and change earlier, and I almost puked. It was awful.” 

These are the people he loves. The people he’s choosing to tie himself to. These absolute dorks. 

Ben feels like his heart is going to burst with how much he cares about them all. “Was that before or after we kissed?” he asks innocently. 

Mal flushes pink. “Shut up.” 

“You got to Ben already?” Jay demands, looking kind of pissed. 

Evie beams. “We both did.” she admits prettily. “He kissed Mal, really. It looked pret-ty damn reciprocal to me.” 

Jay glares at the both of them, and swings himself easily over the side of Evie’s chair so that he lands practically on top of Ben. “Cheats, both of you.” he tells them, even as he’s taking Ben’s face up in both of his hands. “Com’ere, princey.” 

Ben leans up into him, and Jay leans down, angling Ben’s head up just-so, and they meet in the middle. Ben tries not to believe in kissing magic, because, frankly, a lot of it has really rape-y and dynamicist undertones that he’s not entirely comfortable with taking part in, but wow. 

A boy just might change his mind for this. 

They break apart after what feels like only a second. Ben’s sure that he looks like an absolute dumbstruck idiot, but that’s not important, because he’s got a cute boy right here on top of him who is  _ still holding his face  _ and that’s worth any amount of stupid that he looks right now. 

“Hey.” Jay says, and well. 

He’s definitely going to be laughing at Ben in a minute, but it’s apparently not enough to stop Ben from saying the first damn thing that comes to mind. He’s comfortable with them all, that’s a good thing. Looking like an idiot in front of someone, the first sign of love. “You’re really good at that,” he says, stupidly. “Like, wow.” 

Jay laughs at him, and Ben can feel the motion of his laughter through both of their bodies, where they’re touching but also in his chest, where the sound takes up a permanent residence. Maybe it’s a pack thing, or maybe it’s just a people-pleasing thing, but making any of the Isle four laugh makes Ben feel warm all over. 

“Practice makes perfect?” Jay says, still grinning down at Ben. He’s also still holding him in place, so Ben leans into it, trying to communicate that yes, he would like to be the source of some more practice, please. 

It’s even better the second time. Wow. 

Wow. “Do I really get all of you guys?” Ben asks. “Like, for real? For boyfriends?” 

Mal chokes on her laugh. “Hah! Only if you’re sure you know what you’re getting into, princeling.” she says. “We’re fine on our own too. It’s not like we’ve been pining away for you all this time.” 

She’s getting defensive because she cares. She wants him ( _ they  _ want him), and she’s trying to push him away so it won’t hurt if he rejects them. Ben’s done a whole unit of psychology, in addition to his court training, so he’s got this one down. Talking to royalty who are getting defensive because they don’t want to admit to wanting things is a specialty of his. 

“Yeah.” Ben says, softly. Soft voice, calm reassurances. Not overbearing. “I can tell.” 

Somebody is laughing at him. Evie, maybe? Carlos? It’s not Mal, so that’s fine. Laughing at him is so much better than what Audrey did whenever he said something kind of stupid, which was usually sighing and ignoring him until he apologized for doing  _ regular things.  _ (Ben’s not actually stupid, and he did recognize that going all silent and annoyed was Audrey’s way of dealing with like, the stress of trying to present a perfect facade of princess-ness all the time, but that doesn’t mean it was nice to be around. Ben’s mother is the queen, and she’s allowed to be silly.) 

“Aw, Jay, you broke him!” somebody says, and then they’re close, and oh, that’s Mal, running a hand through his hair. 

“You break it, you buy it?” Ben asks hopefully “Please?” 

Mal laughs again, loud and bright like she can’t help herself. “We’re buying you for sure, princeling.” she says. “No returns for damaged goods, you hear me? You’re ours now.” 

Ben leans up into her touch. “Good.” 

“You are!” Mal exclaims. “It’s weird, really. We’re too cool for you.” 

“You’re  _ so  _ cool.” Ben says earnestly, and then, because nobody else seems to be doing anything, “Can I get kissed again? Please? I’ve had a really long day and I’m going to fall asleep the second I lie down and I’d really like to be kissed again before that happens.” 

“Ha.” Mal says, and swoops in for another truly spine-ratting kiss. She’s bitey, and he’s got her on one side kissing him, and Jay on the other still touching him, and it’s so good. 

Mal pulls back before anyone can try and push things past kissing territory. It is late, after all, and they are sitting in the back common room in the mostly-dark. It is possibly not the best time to get into anything, no matter how much any of the involved parties would like to, or how cool it would be to start the day with a coronation and end it with a-- well.

Is it technically an orgy, Ben wonders, if not everyone is directly involved? If it’s just one person being passed around?  _ Would  _ they even want to pass him around, or would they couple up around him? He’s almost positive that Mal and Evie are a couple, if the school rumor mill and an eyewitness account from Audrey, who claims to have seen them making out in the library, are to be believed. 

Also, like, his own eyes. He’s been hanging out with them kind of a lot in the last few weeks. Maybe they’d let him stick with them. Maybe not, though, and he  _ would  _ get to see all of them, somehow. 

Thinking about how they could work out sex between the five of them is far from the most useful thing that Ben could be doing right now. Maybe they have boundaries (they don’t, Ben’s brain reminds him. They really, really don’t.) and maybe they don’t want to bring him into everything right away. Maybe they want to wait, and take it slow, and not make the traditional Auradon-Prep couple journey down to the clearing at the edge of the woods, where everyone  _ knows  _ the cool couples go to make out during free periods, and where Alvira and Roald got caught hooking up last year. 

Not helping. 

Back to useful thoughts. He’s gotta get back to his own room, without tripping over anything in the dark. If he falls and smashes his face in, that’s going to be bad. Nobody will want to kiss him with a bloody face. Think about tripping, yeah. Gotta make sure he’s got enough battery left for the whole walk back. 

“Hey, kingling,” Mal says. “You’re zoning out on me. Looks like it’s bedtime for little boys.” 

That’s fair. That’s totally fair, and it would be rude of him to expect anything else. Unfortunately for Ben, before he can come up with any kind of reasonable protest that no, really, he wants to stay here and canoodle forever, his body takes over and forces him into a jaw-cracking yawn. 

“Looks like.” Ben is forced to admit. “But I’ll see you tomorrow, right?” 

Mal bumps her chin against the top of his head. “If I don’t see you first, yeah.” she says. “We can come over after brunch, if you’re willing to let a bunch of villains like us into your room.” 

Oh. Actually-- 

“Actually.” Ben says. “I could, um, if you want to eat with me? In my room? I’ve got meetings after, but I’m allowed to have people over before that. Or if you don’t want to, after is fine too. Uh. Whatever you want.” 

“Hmm.” Mal says, slowly. “Does this offer come with chocolate-chip pancakes?” 

“Of course.” Ben reassures her. “All the pancakes you could want. The staff will be happy I’m hanging out with friends again, they get on my case whenever they think I’m doing too much kingdom work, so they’ll be thrilled if I tell them to bring extra pancakes.” 

“Well then.” Mal says. “I think we’ll have to be there. Can’t have the staff thinking their little kingling doesn’t have any friends, obviously.” 

“Obviously!” Ben echoes. “Can’t have them thinking that.” 

“Clearly, it’s important that the king of Auradon has friends. And that he’s not sneaking a girlfriend or boyfriend or whatever into his room.” 

“I’d never.” Ben says seriously. “I don’t have a _ single  _ joyfriend to sneak in. Not one.” 

That gets him another kiss, on the head this time. Mal bonks her chin against the crown of his head afterwards, like she’s just resting there. Chilling. 

“So.” she says, and Ben can feel her words. “Since we’ve established that you don’t have a  _ single  _ person you’re going to be dating, we’re cool to see you tomorrow, and you’re going to get us all the breakfast food we want, and we can talk about all the other stuff then.” 

“Right.” Ben says, and yawns again. “Breakfast and talking-- tomorrow.” 

Mal turns her head so that she’s pressing her cheek, rather than the point of her chin against Ben’s head. “Talking tomorrow. Right now it looks like bedtime for little kinglings.” 

“Okay.” Ben agrees, reluctantly. He’s really tired, and even though he’d like to stay out here with Mal and her pack,  _ his  _ pack, he’s pretty sure that if he tries to stay up any longer he’s going to fall asleep right here in the common room, and then he’ll never hear the end of it. 

Mal hops up. Her pack stands with her, and Jay pulls Ben up with him. 

“We’ll walk you home.” Mal announces, eyes glittering. “It’s only polite. Can’t leave a royal boy alone after curfew.” 

Ben’s not going to complain. “Sure.” he says. “I might not be great conversation though, fair warning.” 

“Oh, we know.” Evie says. 

Ouch. 

“She means we get it, you don’t have to push yourself.” Carlos clarifies, coming up behind Ben so quietly that if Ben wasn’t already half asleep he would’ve jumped out of his skin. “You’re cool, okay? We can just walk with you.” 

It’s not the polite thing to do, but Ben wants to reach over and touch him. Hold hands, maybe. Mal’s got one hand already claimed, but Ben’s got two. He wants to touch Evie too, but he hasn’t gotten to kiss Carlos even  _ once  _ tonight, and he likes him  _ so much.  _ Before he liked Mal, even, he liked this cute fucking kid, who’s smart and sharp and only speaks up in class when he’s got something bitingly clever to say, and can run like the devil despite claiming that he hates every minute of it. 

(it’s not important, Ben knows, but he’s pretty sure that Carlos would be way happier on the track team, where he could be good at something and not make that face he does every time he’s expected to block someone instead of dodging in Tourney. Not that sports are important right now, or that it’s any of Ben’s business what he thinks the VKs should be doing with their extracurriculars. He also thinks that Evie would love debate, even though it’s mostly a team of boys and sidekicks right now, and she’d be so good at ripping them apart, and Mal would probably benefit from trying one of the art classes they run for the younger kids at the studio in town. They hire a lot of Auradon prep students during the summer to run classes, and he thinks that Mal would like it, having something to focus her energy on that’s not scheming or drawing crazy detailed diagrams of the objects in the castle. It’s none of his business, but he thinks about it a lot, what he would do to make these kids happy, if they ever ask him for ideas.) 

“Okay.” Ben says, out loud. Eloquently-like, because he’s a king now. “Can I kiss your face?” 

“Um.” Carlos looks confused. “I guess?” 

Oh. That’s-- it’s not quite the reaction that Ben was expecting, is all. 

“Do you not want me to?” Ben asks. Mal is trying to pull him through the dark maze of chairs, but he can talk and walk at the same time, that’s okay, and Carlos is following him anyway. Evie’s there too, right behind him. She’s good at people-wrangling, she’ll step in and smack somebody if Ben gets too out of line. 

“No-oo.” Carlos says. “I do. It’s fine.” 

He steps up, and Ben stops walking so that they can get lined up without smacking each other in the face with their face, and Ben gently, ever so gently, kisses Carlos. 

It’s nice. Soft, not pushing or anything. Just a little goodnight smack, to say that hey, they care about each other, and yeah, they’re gonna talk more in the morning. A perfectly princess-appropriate kiss, the kind of thing Ben might do with a girlfriend for a picture, but a little bit better than that. 

They pull apart. Carlos steps back, and Ben realizes that yeah, he was up on his toes to reach, and yeah, he’s pretty sure that’s cute as all get-out. “Thanks.” Ben says, a little bit stupidly. “That was nice.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Pretty nice, yeah.” 

“Not quite up to Mal’s standards.” Carlos says quietly, like he’s worried that not being just like Mal is a problem, like he thinks Ben is only going along with this whole thing because he likes Mal, even though Ben is pretty sure they just spent like, a whole lot of time working out that this is _exactly not that._ “If everyone was like Mal, I’m pretty sure the school would’ve burned down by now.” Ben says. “She’s kind of a force of nature.” 

In front of him in the dark, Mal snorts. 

“Anyway.” Ben admits, softer now, “I like variety in my kissing. That’s why I’ve got four of you, right?” 

Somebody moves in on his left side, and brushes their lips over his temple. “Right.” Evie says. “A different villain for every scheme.” 

“Right.” Ben echoes softly, and then, before he can think of what else to say, Mal breaks in. 

“You’re very cute and all.” she says flatly, “But we actually do need to move if we don’t want to get caught out after curfew tonight. Benny-boy’s gotta get returned safe or else he’ll turn into a beast, and I didn’t bring my animal-wrangling gloves to this particular rendez-vous.” 

“Right.” Ben says again. “Yeah.” and lets Mal pull him along home. They’re going to talk more in the morning, and he’s going to get the pancakes to prove it. 

+++

They do get pancakes, actually. The VKs pile into Ben’s space at an utterly reasonable hour, all things considered, and don’t even complain about it when Ben ignores them long enough to shower and get his head back on straight.

They talk about school, and about Evie’s plans for her business. Mal only bites the people who want her to, which is always a win, and in between they talk about some of the crazy things she’s done in the past to people who’ve tried to fuck with her. They also talk a whole lot about boundaries, and expectations, and how many people they can fit onto one bed, especially if some people are significantly larger than some other people, and how even if the smaller people can fit in a smaller space, they are not obligated to fit there if they would rather spread out like a starfish on their own bed and not touch anyone at all. 

It’s a good talk. Ben comes out of it uncomfortably full of delicious breakfast food, and with a pack who is currently sworn to secrecy about their relationship in the interest of Ben not losing his kingdom before he can take control of it, and oh yeah, he’s got a pack now. 

All in all, it’s a pretty great way to start his first day as king. 


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always for this work, chapter breaks come from the heart, not the plot.

One week ‘til finals. 

Ben and Evie, as the only two responsible students of the crew, (Mal’s words, not his, even though Ben is pretty sure that she’s right) are hiding out in Ben’s office trying to finish the last of their council work before they make the trek back over to the girl’s room to work on homework with the rest of their little misfit crew. Ben is considering the merits of stabbing his pen through his own eye rather than read one more word when he hears Evie put down her pen. 

Okay, so maybe it’s a little bit creepy, how much attention he pays to her sometimes. He’s pretty sure most people can’t hear things like a single pen scratching, or people whispering from across the dining room, though, and he  _ knows  _ that most betas can’t smell like he can, so he’s got an excuse. Curses linger in the blood even after they’ve been broken, after all, and magically enhanced senses aren’t so creepy when they’re genuinely something that he can’t help. 

“Hey, Ben?” Evie asks. 

Ben looks up. She’s sitting across from him at the big desk that takes up the bulk of the little room (and really, it’s pretty silly that the school gave him an office when he can do his work just as well at the desk in his room, or in the library with everyone else, but it’s nice to have when he can see Evie all focused like this, in a way that she’s just  _ not  _ when they work other places.)

“Yeah?” he says. 

Evie’s fidgeting a bit with her pen, which is weird. Evie’s good, better than Ben even, at maintaining her composure no matter what thoughts are going through her mind.

She sighs. “It’s been a while since we started doing, y’know,  _ this. _ ” she says, a tiny bit of color rising on her cheeks. “Being together, all five of us.” 

Ben isn’t sure what to make of this, but it  _ has  _ been a while. Since October, since his ‘pet project’ kids decided to choose goodness on their own terms and stay in Auradon, instead of running off to make their own destinies. He’s never going to stop being grateful for that. 

“Almost the whole semester, yeah.” he says out loud. Maybe she wants him to remember their two-and-a-half-month anniversary? He hadn’t thought that was something he was supposed to remember, but maybe with girls, with Evie, or the Isle kids specifically, two-and-a-half months means something that it doesn’t in Auradon. 

Evie touches his hand, bringing him out of the thought. She’s looking at him with those sparkly eyes of hers, and she’s got an expression that Ben doesn’t know how to interpret, kind of gentle, but also a bit fake, like the big smile that she puts on when she needs to look like a pretty princess in meetings so that people will underestimate her and tell her exactly what she wants to know under the assumption that she won’t care about any of it. 

“I know that this isn’t the best time,” Evie says, slowly, “but we have something that we need to talk to you about.” 

Oh, shit. That’s not good, probably. “Yeah, for sure!” Ben rushes to assure her. “Whatever you need.” 

When Evie doesn’t answer immediately, Ben starts to feel worse. Maybe that was the wrong thing to say, and she doesn’t want reassurances, doesn't want him to keep doing whatever he can to make her feel good. Maybe she’s mad at him for always going out of his way to make them all comfortable, and she’s sick of him trying to do whatever it takes to help her family, even though he keeps telling them that doing things to make them feel good isn’t a problem for him, it’s something that makes him happy, maybe he’s overstepping too far this time, and she’s just waiting for him to figure it out--

“Are you… breaking up with me?” Ben tries. He doesn’t want to break up, but he would understand, if it were to happen. They’ve had each other for longer than they’ve had him, and as much as he thinks they like him, it would also make sense if he’s just been another piece of getting them all used to Auradon, and now that they’ve been here for a while semester, they’ve gotten used to life off the Isle, and they don’t need a local boyfriend to guide them around anymore. 

Evie, unexpectedly, gasps. “No!” she squeaks out. “Ben! No! We aren’t. I’m not. We really like you.  _ I  _ really like you, and Mal won’t let you break up with us as long as I still want you here.” 

Ben can feel himself grinning like an idiot. It’s the flood of sheer relief flooding through him, probably. “But you’re always going to like me, right Eves?” 

Evie blushes the prettiest shade of pink when she’s flustered. “As much as I’m sure of anything.” she says. “We’re never letting you go.” 

Ben just  _ has  _ to lean over the desk and kiss her pink cheeks. He’s got to. It’s a need, not a want. Gotta kiss his girlfriend when she’s being sweet. 

Evie settles back once she’s been kissed properly, and Ben follows her lead, pulling his jacket back down into place from where it got all rumpled leaning over the table. He gives Evie a moment to get herself back in order, but when she doesn't say anything else, he has to do something. “But there’s something?” Ben prompts, gently. That’s the key with his girlfriends, he’s found. They’re used to pushing back against demands, but gentleness flusters them into talking like nothing else. (It’s different with his boyfriends, who thrive on direct words and clear intentions, but they’re a different story entirely). 

Evie, predictably, goes pink again. “Yes. We wanted to know, if, um.” She pauses. “Maybe, no pressure, you would want to spend a-- a heat with us?” she finishes in a rush. 

Ben’s brain is broken, it’s got to be, the long hours or the mind-numbing legalese he’s been going through for the last hour and a half, or something, because Ben swears, would swear in royal court even, that his mind goes completely blank at Evie’s words. 

His kids  _ (his kids!!!! The same ones who wouldn’t talk to him except to mock his-- everything, just a few months ago!!!) _ want to invite him ( _ him!!!!)  _ to be there while they’re going to be incredibly vulnerable with each other, and not even because they’re afraid for their lives anymore!! Just because they like him!! Him, like Ben!! Not even because he’s the crown prince and can give them a better social status, but just because they’ve been hanging out, dating, for months now and they trust him!!

“Ben?” Evie prompts sweetly, and Ben suddenly remembers, right, he still hasn’t said anything back, and he’s got to do that, this is how he gets the things he suddenly  _ wants.  _

“I’m-- yeah.” he stutters out. “Yeah, for sure! I want that! With you guys.” 

At his clumsy words, Evie visibly relaxes. “Oh, thank the gods.” she says, flopping back in her chair. “We thought you would. I told Mal you were a sure thing and we didn’t need to do it like this, but you know how she gets--” 

Ben laughs, picturing it. “Evie,” he says, making his voice stern, “you have to talk to him. Beta-to-beta. It’s the only way we’ll get through to him.” He laughs again. “Right?” 

Evie giggles. “Oh my gosh, were you spying on us? She was all, like--” Evie makes a kind of push-pull gesture, and switches to a breathy voice. “--you’ve gotta do it, babe!! He won’t listen to me!!” 

Ben tries to smother his laugh, but it doesn’t matter, because he’s with Evie, and she  _ gets  _ him. “Hah! I wish. I would have known what you meant from the start then, instead of giving myself a heart attack thinking you were breaking up with me.” 

“Aww, baby!” she exclaims, reaching over to pat his arm. “We wouldn’t break up with you like this! We’d all be here for it, and maybe leave you chocolate or something. We care about you enough to give you a real breakup, at least.” 

Ben can’t stop laughing, and it feels so nice, to know that these amazing, prickly children care about him so much. “Thanks. So, next time you all gang up on me in here, I’ll know-” 

Evie nods. “You’ll know to run away before we can get the words out, exactly!” she says seriously. 

Ben is pretty sure he’s crying real tears of laughter. “Evie.” he gets out. “Eves.” 

The perfect red corner of her mouth twitches. “Ben.” 

“I love you.” 

Her poker face melts, and she reaches up to pet a hand down over his cheek. “Love you too, pretty boy.” 

They lose a minute like that, after Ben catches her hand and presses it to his lips. The desk is still between them, sure, but they’re both pretty tall, and Evie is inspirational, if not always for the right activities. 

Ben catches himself, before they can get up to anything that would necessitate moving around the desk, or else Evie stops them, and they separate with the soft slick noise of gentle kisses. “When is this next heat?” Ben asks. Thinking ahead is important, and if he has to clear his schedule, it’s better to do it sooner rather than later. 

Evie winces. “Yes. About that.” 

Ben reaches out to hold her hand. Boyfriending 101, hard conversations always go over better with a little reassurance. “Eves, I’ll make it happen. Don’t make that face, come on.” 

Evie laughs, but it sounds tight and forced. “I’m not making a face!” she insists, even as she’s relaxing the lines around her eyes out into the blankly beautiful mask she uses in public. “No faces here.” 

Ben gives her hand a little squeeze. “Sure.” he says. Boyfriending 201. Sometimes obvious lies are there for a reason, and not every point can be pushed on at once. 

Evie takes a moment, composing herself. Ben waits. 

“You know how finals are starting next week?” Evie finally says cautiously. 

Ben is very much aware. 

Evie probably catches his expression, because she goes on with a little apologetic nod. “Yeah. So. Next week. It’s really not ideal.” 

Not ideal is an understatement. Finals at Auradon Prep are a big deal, to the point that students have failed entire semesters of class work based on one bad final. They’re trying to emulate the structure of a higher education environment, is the reasoning, and for all that Ben is the crown prince, he hasn’t been able to convince the school board that giving students a week of straight exams right before they split and travel home for winter break isn’t the best thing to do. Apparently evidence of a dozen students in the past few years nodding off on their trains home and needing to be collected in various unintended locations isn’t enough evidence, and the school board believes that the benefit of a competitive environment and personalized routes of study outweighs the stress that it puts on students who are afraid to fail an entire semester in one week. 

“What’re you guys gonna do?” Ben asks, out loud. The VKs haven’t been through a finals season at Auradon Prep yet, and dealing with biology in addition to the stress isn’t going to make it an especially pleasant first finals experience. 

“Hope it holds off.” Evie says. “Make some offerings. Hope for the best.” 

Ben sucks in a sharp breath. “Yikes.” 

“We have-- “ Evie makes a kind of weighing hand gesture. “it’s not an _ exact _ thing, knowing when it’ll happen. Carlos thinks it’s going to be right after finals, if we’re lucky. And there are always drugs and stuff that he can use for the worst of it if not. It’s not fun, but I think they’ll work, if we don’t have any other options.” 

Ben frowns. “He doesn’t want to use them?” he asks. “I thought--” 

He trails off, watching Evie’s face. She’s been working on this recently, letting her guard down around Ben. She’s so used to putting on her perfect princess mask and keeping emotions inside while she’s around anyone except the others that it still takes effort to allow her real expressions to show around Ben, but she’s getting there. Evie lets herself audibly sigh, and doesn’t even plaster on a smile afterwards. It’s progress, even from five minutes ago. 

“They’re nasty stuff, Ben,” she explains. “We haven’t had access to the real pills before, only the aftermarket stuff that made it over to the isle, so I don’t know how well they’re going to work. I’ve only ever seen the aftermarkets before, and they  _ do _ usually work, but--” 

Ben is running his thumb over the back of her hand. “Yeah?” 

“They’re not especially safe.” 

He frowns, processing. “You’re not going to use those-- aftermarkets, right? Evie, you don’t have these with you, do you?” 

She does, of course, but Ben probably shouldn’t know that. She might have chosen good, those few months ago, but that doesn’t mean she has to give up all her secrets. Evie knows how to keep her knives close to her chest, and the contents of her medicine bag are some of the biggest metaphorical knives she’s got. “I wouldn’t use anything that’s really dangerous.” Evie deflects, instead. 

Ben is frowning, now. He looks like he might be getting genuinely upset, which isn’t what Evie meant to happen at all. “I can talk to Fairy Godmother,” he offers. “She can get you guys testing exemptions, or something. We can work this out.” 

Of course, nobody’s told him yet. It’s always Evie’s job, somehow, to tell people the things they should be able to realize on their own. 

“Ben, I appreciate it, I really do. I love that you care so much. It’s a great thing about you.” 

“But?” 

Evie pats his arm, to gentle the blow. “We already talked to Fairy Godmother. She’s the one who suggested the pills. The real ones.” 

“Oh.” 

“It was a really good thought.” 

Ben looks kind of deflated. He’s usually so bouncy, but learning how his home actually works to help the people outside his royal circle is hard. The mermaids were a particularly hard blow. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, not unkindly, like some people do, but like he really means it. “I didn’t think.”

God, it feels like he’s never thinking. He tries so hard, and then things like this jump out, just when it feels like he’s finally got a handle on starting to think from the perspective of others. Of course none of the adults want to give exceptions to the VKs. They’re villains, obviously, it wouldn’t do to give them any possible advantage, because that’s when they’ll take it too far, in the eyes of the adults. Reasonable exceptions are for good children, people they can trust not to take advantage of them, even when it’s just leveling the playing field. It had taken weeks to get them time extensions for tests, and even with that, the boys are still going to have to take their exams in a private test room where they’re going to be watched the whole time, rather than the main hall with the other students in their classes. 

Evie pats Ben’s arm again. “It’s okay.” 

It’s not okay, but Ben is still working on convincing his people that they deserve nice things, not just the bare minimum they need to survive. Things like test exemptions, yeah, and trust from adults and people who aren’t just Ben and the circle of sympathetic Auradon kids they’ve been building for themselves, but also things like hot chocolate, and eyeliner that isn’t one use away from falling apart, and socks without so many holes patched in them that they’re more patch than sock. 

Ben heaves in a breath. He wants to yell, to shout at the people who have told his family that they need to constantly make excuses and apologize just for existing, but he can’t do that. Running down to Fairy Godmother’s office to explain the situation himself might get results, but Ben is experienced enough now with VK logic to know that it’s going to add another mark to the tally that none of them will admit to having of yet another thing that they owe him for. It’s not that Ben minds throwing his power around to get what he wants (And really, it’s what  _ should  _ be happening anyway. If they were Auradon-born, the things that they’ve had to put up with would have had teachers reprimanded for even thinking about the shit they’ve said about Ben’s people). 

So. Ben does not yell. He does not rant. He will not ask Fairy Godmother himself, because that’s not what they want him to do for them, no matter how much difference it would make and how little time it would take him to do. 

Instead, Ben takes in a breath. “What can I do?” he asks. 

++

Evie pulls Ben through the door of the girl’s room. They hang out in other places too, of course, but since the girl’s room is in one of the towers and a bit further away from people who might overhear things they shouldn’t, it’s their favorite place. It’s also cozier than Ben's room, and because of the tower drafts, they have an extra space heater for the winter months that all of Ben’s VKs like to huddle around when they’re feeling cold and sad. There are fireplaces in the common rooms, of course, but Mal told him once that it’s not the same as being trusted to have things in their own space. The Isle stays colder than the mainland, she’d said, something about the constant cloud cover, so they appreciate the extra warmth. Their non-magic humans, especially, spent the first sixteen years of their lives always being cold (and hungry, but that’s an issue for another day) and they’re still enjoying the novelty of being comfortable even in the winter. 

The door isn’t locked, which isn’t a surprise anymore, in a nice way that makes Ben feel awfully soft and protective whenever he thinks about it. Evie pulls him by the arm, and flings the door open with so much enthusiasm that Ben stumbles, nearly tripping over the doorway on the way in. 

“I brought Ben!” Evie announces to the room at large. “We’re back!” 

Mal glances up from her textbook. “Ugh, why?” 

The corner of her mouth is twitching, so Ben knows she doesn’t mean it. She’s got a little ponytail holding the top part of her hair out of her eyes, and she’s wearing blue pajama pants that don’t belong to her, and geez, Ben loves this girl. 

“Ouch.” he says, laying a hand to his chest in mock pain anyway, just for appearances. “I see how it is.” 

“Awww,” Jay calls from the other bed, the one that’s nominally where Evie sleeps. “Come sit with us, boyfriend. We’ve got space.” 

Ben takes a second to think about it, but a bed with two boyfriends who are willing to put up with his cuddling is a better choice than one with two girlfriends who haven’t seen each other in hours, and probably won’t. Also, the boyfriend's bed has a dog. 

He moves. 

“Oof.” says a boyfriend, without enthusiasm. 

Ben shifts his weight. It’s safer this way, less likely to end in accidental stabbings than if he was to flop on top of, say, Mal. The boys are just as armed, but they’re less inclined to pull a knife on Ben just because he’s a cuddler. 

Actually. 

Ben rolls over, scooting up the bed so that he can get his head on one boyfriend’s shoulder, and pulls the other one up to sprawl over his lap, instead of leaving him upside down half off the bed. The dog moves on his own. “I’m leaving you, Mal!” Ben calls over. “I live here now.” 

“Land of misfit boys.” Carlos says absently, without lifting his eyes from his phone. Ben’s created kind of a monster by giving him a cell phone, he knows, but an unhealthy obsession with mobile gaming isn’t the worst thing ever. Ben’s pretty sure that he’s going to be the one coding more levels for Clash of Truth once he runs out anyway, so that’s kind of like learning. Sort of. 

“Fine by me, priceling!” Mal calls back to him. “Enjoy your man-harem over there. I’ll just be with my girlfriend, undoing all your work.”

She’s pulling pins out of Evie’s hair as she’s talking, so that’s probably what she means. There can’t really be a spell for siphoning knowledge out of other people’s minds and into your own, no matter what Mal claims to be able to do. She wouldn’t be getting a C- in kingdom history if there was. 

“You’re so mean to me.” Ben tells her, but really, he’s got two people who are willing to let him cuddle them over here, so who’s the real winner? Not the girls, that’s for sure. 

“You know it.” Mal says. She’s not really studying anymore, more dedicated to pulling out all of Evie’s braids than to keeping her place in the textbook. Ben tries to catch a glimpse at the cover, but it’s hard to see from this angle, so he gives up. Mal will pass all of her classes, probably, or else she won’t, and one night of Ben trying to help her study when his brain already feels like mush from trying to scan legal documents from a hundred years ago isn’t going to make much difference either way. 

“Mm.” Ben mumbles, which isn’t really an answer. Carlos has moved up just enough that Ben can get a hand in his hair, and the way he’s trying to press up into Ben’s hand without breaking eye contact with the little pixelated monsters on the screen is a little distracting. 

Ben really did want to talk about this. Figuring out Big Relationship Things is more important than getting distracted watching his boyfriends blow up pixels and-- Ben sneaks a glance over at Jay’s textbook-- study for a math exam. Even though it’s nice, doing these things. Jay tilts the book over so that Ben can see better. 

“Does this look right?” he asks, pointing at a chunk of scratch paper he’s got wedged in the pages, with a string of proofs scribbled on it. 

Ben takes a second to read through it. It’s not quite as difficult as it would have been even a month ago. “Yeah.” he says. “I think so, at least. Eves would know.” 

Evie perks up. “Eves knows what? Everything you could ever need to know?” 

“Math.” Jay says despairingly, flopping over so that he’s leaning on Ben. “It’s all math.” 

“Oh.” Evie scrunches her nose. “I can check your problem sets, I guess. Hand ‘em over.” 

The textbook takes a short flight to a hard landing. “Rude.” Evie says, leaning off the bed to scoop the book up from the floor. “You could at least pretend to have better aim.” 

“Math deserves it,” Jay grumbles, mostly in Ben’s ear. Evie’s the most responsible one in terms of studying, but Jay isn’t actually bad at school, if he cares about the subject. He’s really good at memorizing names and dates and rules for chivalry (breaking them is a conscious choice, rather than the willful ignorance that Mal chooses to cultivate), but for some reason, math just doesn’t click for him unless they drill each concept to death before testing time. It’s making studying for finals into quite the ordeal. 

Oh, right. Finals. That’s why they have to talk about this tonight. “Can I talk to you guys?” Ben asks out loud “Like, all of you?”

Mal spits out a couple hairpins. She’s been practicing, and it doesn’t even look like there’s bite marks on them this time. “Yeah.” she says, all faux-casual, like she didn’t know this was going to happen when she sent Evie to talk to him in the first place. “Sure.” 

Evie, who knows everything, shoots a significant-eyebrow face over at Ben. “Maybe put our boy down first?” she suggests archly. 

It’s a good idea, probably. Ben’s pack is all about having hard conversations while literally draped on top of each other, but considering the nature of the conversation they need to have, it’s probably best to give Carlos an easy escape route in case it goes badly. Not that it’s going to go badly. 

Oh, god. 

Ben stretches over to rap on the wood post of the bed, just in case he’s managed to jinx things just by thinking about the possibility of them going wrong. It’s maybe the wrong move; Jay, freed of his textbook at last, uses the opportunity to shove his way onto Ben’s lap. 

“Trade off!” he announces, and pushes Carlos onto the floor. 

There’s a thump, and then a clatter as the phone goes flying

. “Ouch.” Carlos says, flatly. “Why.” 

Mal is laughing. “You get what you get, furball!” she calls over to Carlos. “Go on, reclaim your honor. Push him back.” 

Carlos looks up at Ben. He’s doing the thing where he makes his eyes look all giant and sad, like if you’ve ever thought for a second that he could be anything less than a sweet little boy who has done nothing wrong in his life ever, you’re the evil one. It didn’t work with them when he accidently set the door on fire a few weeks ago and the whole dorm had to evacuate in the pouring rain, and it’s not going to work now. Ben is stronger than this. He’s been practicing. No amount of pouting is going to get him out of this one. 

God damn it. 

Luckily for Ben, he’s got another boyfriend who is not afraid to use meaner methods to keep his place on the bed. “Nope.” Jay says, and kicks ineffectually at Carlos when he moves to climb back up. “Get off. Go sit with the dog if you’re gonna be all clingy.” 

Ben feels awful, but it’s probably for the best, or something. Besides, it’s not like sitting on the floor, with a comfortable blanket they keep on the floor for this exact purpose, and his little dog, who, okay, is already moving to settle down on his human’s lap, is exactly a hardship for Carlos. The face he’s making is just excessive. Ben might be soft, but he’s not stupid, and none of the others are getting the kicked puppy look. 

Mal looks at Ben, and at Carlos pouting on the floor, and seems to decide immediately that talking about her feelings is going to be less painful than watching this play out. 

“So!” She says brightly. “What did you want to talk about, exactly, Benny-boo?” 

Oh. Okay. She’s going right to the point. “Right.” Ben says. “Yeah. Evie said you want me to come spend a heat with you all?” 

Mal glances over at Evie, and then nods. “Yeah. Yep. We want that.”

“Yeah.” 

“For sure.” 

Alright. Ben mostly already knew that they were all on board, but he feels a little bit better, knowing that yes, this isn’t just a case of Mal and Evie dragging the boys into something they aren’t sure about. “What do I need to do to make that happen?” he asks. 

Mal trades another look with Evie, and then she pops up and practically throws herself on top of the Ben-and-Jay tangle on the other bed. Evie follows, albeit at a somewhat more dignified pace, and plops down next to them so that she can lean her head on Mal’s shoulder. 

“You’re so  _ good,  _ you know that?” Mal says, working a hand in so she can pat Ben’s head. 

“Such a sweet boy.” Evie says, softly. 

“So good for us.” Mal echoes. 

Ben’s not a relationship expert, okay, but he’s still not stupid. “Guys--” he starts. 

“Right now, all you need to worry about is staying away when we tell you to!” Evie says over his attempts at insisting that no, actually, they should really talk about this.. “And keep your phone on. Can you do that for us, sweet boy?”

“Yes, yeah, I can do that--” Ben tries, before Evie cuts him off again. 

“Perfect!” Evie chirps. “That’s all you need to think about, then. We’ll take care of everything else. Promise! It’ll be really nice to just have you with us.” 

Mal starts trying to bite his ear. 

Ben swats her off. It’s nice to feel wanted, but he’s been around long enough by now to figure out  _ some  _ of the VK’s tricks, and distracting him with affection when they want to avoid talking about things isn’t going to work this time. Ben’s smarter than that, and besides, even the limited Auradon Prep curriculum for sex education had managed to emphasize how import it is for couples (and packs, Ben edits in to his mental version of the slide) to discuss a heat plan well before the actual event. There had also been quite a few slides on relationships, and how betas should stick to dating other betas, unless they were beta men dating omega women, or beta women dating alpha men, but those slides had felt odd even at the time, what with Elle’s parents still being together and all, so Ben had taken those particular slides with a grain of salt even at the time. 

Anyway. Discussing things is important, and Ben is not going to let himself get distracted from having an important conversation just because he’s got three pretty people draped on top of him. “No, for real, guys.” Ben tries. “I want to help--” 

“And I’m telling you,” Evie says, and oh, she sounds kind of mad. “We have it under control. You have a lot to deal with already, babe, all the guild stuff and holiday plans,  _ and  _ those castle events you’re supposed to be planning? You’ve got enough to do, and we want to make this fun for you.” 

Oh. 

Oh  _ no.  _

“I want to do this!” Ben insists, hurrying to explain. It’s important that they understand this, that they  _ know  _ they’re not work for him, not now and not ever, not even when being with them means doing hard things, or hurrying to do homework through his meetings because he made the choice to spend time with his people instead of getting it done when he was supposed to. He doesn’t mind being one of the rotation of people who wait outside of Mal’s weekly talk with the school counselor to bring her home, and he’s trying really hard to figure out the right thing to do in the dining hall (he’s pretty sure that just sitting with them is enough. He’s been talking to his own counselor, and she said that support is the best thing he can give). It’s hard, sometimes, but it’s never work, being with them. Especially not when it means spending time with them all, and planning out how best to get through a few days of biology trying to screw them over. 

“You’re not work,” Ben says, “and like, for real? Nothing feels like work when it’s with you guys.” 

Mal makes a kind of snorting-gaspy noise. “Sap.”

“Yeah, well. I feel like I’m so far behind where you guys are with each other sometimes--” Ben wants to stop, because  _ shit,  _ that didn’t come out right at all, he doesn’t really feel behind, and even if he did, saying it like this wouldn’t help anyone. He’s gotta keep talking now anyway, just keep pushing forwards. “And I know that there’s nothing I can do about it, it’s just, like, how time works, and it’s  _ good  _ that you guys have had each other-- but I wanna do this with you. Not as something you’re doing  _ for  _ me, you know?” 

He finishes, and lets the words just-- hang there, for a moment. Nobody jumps in to say anything, which is probably not ideal, but sometimes Ben’s pack needs to let feelings-talk settle for a while before they deal with it, which is usually fine, if a little bit nerve wracking for Ben. 

“Um,” Evie says, eventually. “I’m not sure that I completely get it? Like, I get that you care about us, and we care about  _ you,  _ but like, we want you to enjoy this with us? It’s not a whole lot of work that we’re keeping from you or anything, it’s just.--We really just stockpile food and stuff and try to clear our schedule out for a couple days around when it’s going to hit, but I guess-- we can try? It’s kind of up to C, though?” 

“I’m fine with Ben being here!” Carlos says immediately, like he was just waiting for his chance to jump in. He’s holding Dude in a way that looks kind of aggressively cuddly, though, so Ben’s pretty sure he’s not actually as comfortable as he’s trying to show them he is. “I wanted him in the first place.” 

Evie sucks in a sharp breath. “Okay. Okay!” she says, even though she doesn’t sound the most okay at this exact moment. “This is going just like I planned.” 

Mal unwinds herself from Ben a little bit, reaching out to get an arm around Evie instead. It's a bit of a stretch, considering the respective heights of all the parties in need of cuddling, but it’s a valiant effort on Mal’s part. She pulls, and Evie squishes, and this is fine, actually, for Ben. He’s not quite sure whose foot is digging into the side of his kneecap and quite possibly forcing it out of place, but he’s got two girlfriends who have a basic knowledge of healing spells now, and a lowkey-magical being boyfriend, not to mention another boyfriend who has extensive knowledge of how to fix bodies on the fly, so no matter what injuries might happen from being on the bottom of a three-villain pileup, they’ll figure out how to fix him. 

Someone moves, and whoever has an arm around Ben’s back pats Evie’s shoulder. 

“Aw,  _ Eves. _ ” Jay says, gently. “Hey.” 

Evie untangles one of her hands and carefully wipes under her eyes. “It’s fine!” she says. She’s crying. Oh, god, she’s crying. “I’m stressed, it’s fine.” she says, waving her hands in front of her face. 

Ben can’t really engage in any meaningful physical contact from where he’s already pinned by all of the meaningful physical contact they’re already having, but he makes an effort anyway. “I’m sorry.” he says. “I didn’t mean to make you cry, Eves. Sorry.” 

“It’s okay. Really. I should have known you’d want to be all…” she chokes out a watery laugh through her tears “Nice, and stuff.” 

“You guys deserve that. You deserve nice things.” Ben says. Evie, especially, who works so hard to keep up appearances, deserves to have people appreciating her. 

Evie sniffles. “I know.” she says. “I’m okay, for real. It just kind of-- got to me, all of a sudden.” 

Jay bonks her on the head. They’re working on getting Evie to appreciate herself more, and Evie’s boys have really taken a shine to reminding her whenever she says things that put her feelings last. “It happens,” he says. “S’cool. You can be sad.” 

“Is there anything we can do together? Anything that I could help with?” Ben asks. Redirects back around to something they can work on together. Give Evie some space, in case she doesn’t want to talk about her own feelings right now with everyone. 

Sure enough. “Um, you could help by letting us use your space, maybe?” Evie suggests. “There’s really not like, a lot of preparation or anything that goes into it at this point. We’ve got some of the stuff here, and some stuff we keep in the boy’s room, and then it’s mostly just a matter of coordinating everyone and getting people out of class, and we already decided that we have to put school first this time.” 

“I’m gonna get super fucked up on caffeine and maybe some other stuff and hope it’s enough to delay it.” Carlos offers from the floor, tone bright like he thinks he’s being helpful. 

Ben’s been with them for almost three months now. He’s realized by this point that any time this particular tone comes out, Carlos is fully aware that he is  _ not  _ being helpful. 

“That’s--” Ben tries. “Um. That sure is-- something that could happen?” 

Carlos picks up Dude and starts rocking him like he’s a baby. It doesn’t look especially enjoyable for either party. “Yeah, well.” he says flatly. “It might have to happen. I’m not dealing with icers again.” 

“Ben, we can use your office if anything happens last-minute, right?” Mal asks brightly. 

Oh, geez. Oh no. That’s never good. “What’s going to happen?” Ben asks, trying to keep the dread out of his voice. 

Evie, amazing perfect goddess that she is, realizes that Ben is panicking. “Mal, back off, you’re freaking him out.” she says, pulling Mal literally off of Ben’s back. “Ben, it’s okay. You can help us just by being here. We’ve got phones now, and as long as we all keep them on, nothing is going to go wrong.” 

Mal snorts. She’s not cooperating with being pulled, so it’s almost directly in Evie’s face. You wouldn’t necessarily think that Mal, who is all of five feet tall and skinny as a reed, would be able to resist Evie quite so well, but then again, you also wouldn’t think that Evie, tall and slim and elegant to a fault even in her spiked boots, would be quite so vicious in her attack. 

“Are you manifesting that?” Mal says, sarcastically. “Putting out your energy?” 

Evie stops pulling. “I am.” she says, chin up and not looking at where her girlfriend, in the wake of being pulled, has slid to the ground. 

There’s an ache building up behind Ben’s eyes. “You’re what now?” he asks. 

Mal flops over so that she’s sitting more comfortably on the floor. “It’s a counseling exercise.” she explains. “Manifest the good vibes you want, or something. For example, I’m manifesting all of you guys leaving later so I can get laid tonight. ” 

Ben--stops to think about that for a second. Replays the words.

Nope, it doesn’t make any more sense to him the second time through. 

“What?” Ben asks again, just in case this is a time when things will make sense if he hears them again directly from Mal. It’s not likely, but it might be worth a shot. 

Mal, still laying on the floor, cackles. 

Great. 

Jay nudges Ben with his shoulder, then throws his legs off the bed and stands. “C’mon.” he says. “They’re fucking with you, man.”

Ben follows the lead. “I don’t understand what’s happening anymore.” he says despairingly. “Where did I put my shoes?” 

“I’m taking you for a walk.” Jay says, patiently. He’s a solid dude. Good to have around in times of personal crisis or girlfriend-induced headaches. “Your other shoe is under the bed. And I’ll explain on the way.” 

Ben tugs on his other shoe. “Am I being kidnapped?” he wonders out loud. He’s pretty sure he’d know if he was being kidnapped, but the question feels worth asking anyway. He’s disoriented, and being led away to an unknown location by a person who, while not technically a stranger, is still pretty strange. 

Luckily, Jay laughs instead of taking offence. “Sure.”

“I don’t think it counts as kidnapping if you’re going along with it!” Mal calls out after them. 

“Fuck off!” Jay calls back to her, and then that’s it, the door is closed, and they’re out in the dark. 

It is really fucking dark in the hallway. Which makes sense, because it’s after curfew, and the staff still seems to think that putting all the lights out is going to deter a bunch of teenagers from sneaking into each other’s rooms. It hasn’t worked very well so far, but it’s not something that the school board is willing to change. Ben’s sat in on the school board meetings. He should know. 

Luckily for Ben, he’s not one of the poor idiots who gets caught out after curfew and has to trip back to their room in the dark. He’s got a boyfriend who’s got that magic,  _ baybee,  _ and is also just really good at not running into stuff in the dark. 

Speaking of. Ben hurries up a little, so he’s not being left behind. “What’s going on?” he asks, just in case it’ll get him somewhere this time. 

Jay doesn’t stop, but he does slow down a little, so that Ben’s not stepping quite so loudly to keep up. “I dunno what the girls are doing.” he says. “We’re going out.” 

Okay, then. “Where are we going?” Ben asks. “If I get caught out after curfew again I’m going to get called to the office, just so you know.” 

Jay glances back at him. “Out.” he says simply. There’s a hint of a smile playing around the corners of his eyes, but it’s hidden. A secret, just for the two of them. “And I won’t let you get caught.” 

Well. As long as they won’t get caught, then. No reason to  _ not  _ run across the castle at night, without that threat hanging over their heads. They could do this every night, if it’s just so easy to not get caught. 

Oh. Wait. On second thought, Ben really, really doesn’t need to know if the rest of his pack is, in fact, running wild across the castle at night. That’s something he’s going to choose to remain willfully ignorant about, just for his own sanity. No questions means no answers he doesn’t actually want to know about. 

Maybe one question, actually. It is still winter, even if some people refuse to acknowledge the existence of seasons and wear colorful leather from head-to-toe regardless of the temperature. “Do I need a coat?” Ben asks. “It’s cold out, no matter what you magic guys say.” 

That gets a full grin. “Nope.” Jay says, and reaches out to grab Ben’s hand. “Do you trust me?” 

There’s an obvious answer to that. Ben grabs hold, squeezes tight. Actions over words, and all that. “Lead on.” 

++

Ben is going to die. He’s going to fall and crack his skull open and die, and it’s going to be the most humiliating way that any ruler of Auradon has died in the last hundred year and everyone is going to laugh at his funeral, and it’s going to be his own damn fault, because he’s not coordinated enough to make one short jump. 

Jay is watching him. He’s going to make his boyfriend witness his untimely death, and it’s even worse than if the others were here, actually, because at least if they were all here, they’d be able to bond over watching him fall to his death, instead of leaving Jay to deal with that on his own.

“I don’t know if I can make this,” Ben admits. “I think I’m not coordinated enough for window climbing.” 

“Nah, you totally can.” Jay says. “Look, just move your foot outside the railing--yeah, like that. Now push with your back leg, and--”

Ben jumps. 

His feet hit the windowsill with more force than he was intending, and sure, he maybe barrels directly into Jay, instead of landing beside him like someone who’s cool and coordinated would have done, but he makes it. He’s not dead on the ground, and nobody is going to have to find his body, and that’s a major win in Ben’s book. 

Jay catches hold on his shoulders, steading him. “Hey!” he cheers. “Knew you were gonna make it, man!” 

Ben’s not so sure that he knew he was gonna make it, but it’s so nice to not be worried about falling to his doom that he goes with it anyway. “I’m alive!” he whisper-yells back. “I made it!” 

“Hell yeah!” Jay agrees. “Now you can really see the sights of Auradon prep the way you’re supposed to see ‘em.” 

“Mm, I’m not sure about that.” Ben says. “Ground level has it’s benefits, you know?” 

Jay slides down to sit on one side of the windowsill. “If you’re boring, yeah. You should come up on the roof sometime. It’s really fun up there.” 

Ben can’t help the shiver that goes through him as he moves to sit on the other side. “I think I’ll stick with my feet on the ground, thanks.” he says. 

Jay’s mouth quirks up into a little half-smile. “Suit yourself, man. I like the view.” 

Ben’s been in enough situations at this point in his life to know that he very much does not love the view from most high places, but somehow, it’s a little less terrifying looking out at the room spread below them with someone he trusts by his side. “Do you come up here a lot?” 

Jay lifts a shoulder. “I guess. When I want someplace quiet.” 

Contrary to popular belief, Ben is able to take a hint. He shuts up. 

It’s sort of nice, sitting up in the window. Jay’s right, in that it is quiet, but there’s a kind of peacefulness to looking out across the campus at night, and the chill of the glass next to Ben’s cheek makes things feel more mysterious. Like if he looked out the window at just the right angle, maybe he’d see the ghosts that legend says are wandering the ground at night, victims of the original owners of the seaside castle, underpaid builders who died and were buried in the foundations. 

If Ben looks through the colored panes of glass, it’s like putting a filter on the lawn. Blue birds, hah. The VKs aren’t usually much for sitting quietly like this, but up here, just the two of them, it’s different. It’s nice. 

Ben’s train of thought is broken by the rustling of a candy wrapper. When he looks over at his window partner, Jay is holding out a broken bar of chocolate. 

“You want some?” 

“Thanks.” Ben says, taking a piece. It’s dark, because unlike some people, ( _ Mal _ ) who think white chocolate is good, Jay has decent taste. 

Jay waits a second, until Ben’s mouth is full of chocolate, and then lifts his chin in the kind of effortlessly cool bro-nod that Ben’s pretty sure he’s never going to be able to imitate. “ S’there anything you wanna know? About, like. Us.” Jay says. He hesitates, then makes a kind of unsure gesture with his hands. “I dunno what the girls are up to exactly, but, y’know. I can probably answer a lot.” 

Oh.  _ Oh.  _

“About like, what’s gonna happen next week?” Ben asks, hurrying to swallow and clear his mouth before he loses the chance. 

“Yeah.” 

Ben’s not entirely sure that he’s not dreaming this up, laying on the floor as he bleeds out in a coma-state after falling trying to get up here in the first place. “Are you going to run again if things don’t go according to plan?” he asks “I know it’s not exactly the same situation as last time, but I have to ask, you know?” 

Jay nods, considering. “Ye-ah.” he says slowly. “I don’t know. Mal makes the choices like that, you know?” 

It’s probably safe enough to put a hand on his leg, near where their feet overlap in the middle. The sill might be big, but it’s still not two-teenage-boys-five-feet-apart big. “Alright.” Ben says. “Thanks for being honest with me.” 

Jay shrugs. “Yeah, man. You deserve that from us. It’s shitty to lie to the people you’re dating.” 

“Still. I know Audrey--” Ben cuts himself off. Talking about your ex with your new boo, that’s not cool. Bad boyfriending etiquette, even if dating other boys is different than dating princesses in some ways. “Uh. She. Yeah.” he finishes lamely. “It’s cool. Thanks.”

Jay reaches over to tangle up their fingers, where Ben’s are still resting close to him. “She’s a real piece of work.” 

Ben snorts at that. “Yeah.” he says. “Yeah, she sure is.” 

“The whole, like, public breakup shit?” Jay makes a face. “That was harsh, man. She didn’t need to do that to you.” 

Privately, Ben kind of agrees, but it still feels unfair to reduce Audrey down to how she acted at the very end of their relationship. “She’s going through a lot.” he says, instead of agreeing that yeah, his ex-girlfriend was kind of a jerk. “Her family puts a lot of pressure on her, you know? She’s allowed to be upset sometimes.” 

Jay doesn’t quite roll his eyes, but it looks like it might be a close thing. “Still.” he says. “I know we’re like, still working on the whole accountability thing?” 

Ben nods. The Yes-And nod, that’s what Mal calls it, when she’s being a little bit mean to him. It’s not the full-out Neutral Face Of Acceptance, which Mal really won’t stop mocking him about, no matter how many times Ben tells her that he uses the exact same face in council meetings whenever he has to listen to another old man talk about how accepting sidekicks and villains as fully fledged members of the USA is going to ruin everything, despite all evidence to the contrary, but it’s still up there in terms of Things Mal Likes to Complain About. 

Jay doesn’t seem so bothered by Ben’s face journey. “Like, if you’re gonna take out your stress about not being able to live up to some princessy standards,” he says “Especially when like, nobody else follows them anymore, you’ve  _ gotta _ be able to process that shit for yourself. Reserve some gym time, or whatever. Go yell in the woods.” 

“Yeah.” Ben whispers. He doesn’t-- he’s not blaming Audrey for what happened with them, because it’s not like he was the best boyfriend either, but it still hurts a little bit.

“Her screaming at you for ‘ruining her life’ when she’s the one who kept stonewalling you out, that’s not cool. That’s not asking for support, that’s just being a dick.” 

There’s probably some good response to that. Something about no-fault breakups, and like, Ben’s role in his own life. His social place as the peacemaker carrying over to his relationships, or something. “I guess.” he says, instead of coming up with any of them. 

Jay leans forward, looking intently at Ben. “I’m not kidding, man.” he says. “Everyone’s got their own stuff, you know? And it’s weirder for us, cause like--” Jay breaks off to make a kind of indistinct grabbing gesture. The spiked cuff on his wrist catches the light, throwing little glimmers of moonshine out into the darkness. “You know?” he says, with a little breath that’s not quite laughing at himself. 

Ben makes the gesture back at him. “Pack shit?” he suggests. “Or did you mean the trauma?” 

“Pack shit.” Jay agrees. “And the other one too. But we’re working on it. And you deserve that from us. Like. The best versions of us that we can be.” 

“Hm.” Ben agrees. He’s not sure-- 

Jay shrugs. “I dunno. I’m supposed to be like, our people guy. Good at reading people, you know?” 

“Yeah.” Ben says quietly. “I know.” 

Jay shrugs again, and lets out a long breath. “We’re nuts cause we care, I guess. That’s what I’m trying to say. Evie’s trying to make sure she’s like, showing you the best side of her. She doesn’t want you to think we’re, like, using you just cause you’re nice.” 

Oh. Ben knows how to deal with this one. “I know you aren't,” he says. Reassurance, that’s the key here. Just keep repeating it. “I’m nice ‘cause I want to be.” 

“I know that.” Jay says. Emphasis on the _I_. “Just. Sometimes Eves forgets.” 

Ben moves, very carefully, around on the windowsill, until he can get close enough to throw an arm around his sweet, wonderful boyfriend’s shoulders. The school gossip train is always buzzing about how they’re too touchy with each other, Ben’s pack, but if they knew how much his boys are  _ starving  _ for affection, they’d change their tune, Ben’s sure of it. 

Sure enough, Jay leans into the touch. They’ve only talked about it once, but Ben knows that he likes being the one to get held, rather than the one doing the holding all of the time. So. Ben holds tight, and Jay leans close, and maybe they’re not the greatest at this whole communication thing, but they’re trying, and that’s gotta count for something. It’s going to work out in the end, he’s sure of it. 


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a hot minute since we last updated friends!! I'm in a different state now, very literally. (I moved!!) 
> 
> I also got most of the way through this section before I realized that I had messed up my timeline and put about 12 hours in a single afternoon :/ So now in addition to all my moving notes to myself, I also have an Auradon Prep exam schedule written up on my phone. And then I went through and decided I didn't need timestamps anyway. :/// 
> 
> Fair warning that I did my very best to make the texting portions of this chapter as clear and non-annoying to read as I possibly could. Leave me a comment if you love/hate how I've formatted them! (should I have added the timestamps after all???)

Ben gets a text, right at the start of exams.

**txt from: Eves <3  
** _Hey babe_

It’s not like they don’t talk in person all the time, but Ben and Evie text a lot too. Just fun stuff, not state secrets or anything like that. Mal hates her phone with the kind of burning passion that she usually reserves for things like perky cheerleaders and people who leave the coffee station an unusable mess, so Ben doesn’t text with her so much, but Evie and the boys are adapting to text messaging like the digital natives they would have been, had they not been born on the wrong coast.

Ben’s phone blips again before he can type out a reply.

Eves <3 **  
**_need you to stay away for a few days  
at least til tomorrow :((  
trying to keep things on the dl u know_

Right. That’s probably for the best, if this is about what Ben had been privately calling Pack Shit in his head. He’s not quite as tuned in to the other four as they are to each other, but Ben is a big fan of talking about things when he’s feeling nervous, and so they’ve talked a lot about what they’re going to do this week. Physical proximity to pack members isn’t enough to trigger heat, no matter what the romance novels say, but it can make a difference in the intensity and speed of onset, which means that everyone has been sleeping in their own beds for the past week and half, instead of the cozier arrangements that they’d usually prefer, and they’ve been spending time apart as much as reasonably possible.

Ben’s been sending a lot of baby animal pictures to their group chat, is what he’s saying.

It’s not his favorite thing in the world, staying away from his boyfriend, but in the interest of not contributing to Carlos failing his finals and getting kicked out of school, Ben can do this. He taps out a reply.

Benny boo  
_Got it  
do you need anything else? _

Eves <3  
_nope. thank u babe_

Benny boo  
_< 3_

Eves <3  
_< 3333_

+++

They make it all the way to the third day of finals period without any issues. It feels a little bit like tempting fate but introducing the VKs to the concept of lolcats has been one of the highlights of Ben’s year so far, and he’s not going to stop sending encouraging animals now just because they’re almost done.

 **VKs All Day (group mms)**  
Benny boo  
_Good luck everyone!!  
(goodluck_panda.gif) _

Eves <3  
_omg it’s so cute!!  
good luck to you too!_

Evie, through a twist of good luck that they’re all hoping will carry through to the rest of them as well, doesn’t have any exams until the afternoon.

JJ  
_Some of us have morning finals_

Some people are a little bitter about Evie’s good luck.

Eves <3  
_you have at least 15 minutes before it’s phones off  
don’t be a baby_

They’re not together in person, but Ben can picture the face that Evie must be making at her phone right now. It’s somewhere between exasperation and amusement. Her eyebrows do a thing. It’s extremely cute.

JJ  
_:/_

Eves <3  
_You’re gonna do great  
remember your notes, and DONT LOOK AT THE CLOCK  
You're gonna crush it._

Benny boo  
_yeah!! You got this!_

They’ve been studying together even though they’re in different math classes, so Ben’s not speaking out of some misplaced confidence here. So long as nothing goes catastrophically wrong, Jay’s going to do just fine.

JJ  
_:)  
  
_

+++

An hour later, Ben is not in the best mood ever.

His last final was scheduled for this morning, except the proctor got in late, and the exam ran over, which would be fine, except that Ben had been planning on meeting up with the girls before they went in for their history of magical creatures exam in the early afternoon block, and by the time he got out of the advanced chivalry classroom, there was a missed call from Lumiere that had to be taken care of, and there wasn’t enough time to see the girls off before their exam started, and it feels like all of his duties are piling up as fast as Ben can deal with them, and with the holidays approaching, his prince duties are increasing faster than his academic responsibilities are diminishing, and it’s enough to drive Ben almost to tears.

So. He’s not in the greatest mood ever. He’s got to get some papers from his office now, instead of seeing his girlfriends, because apparently this is the ideal week for the committee for sidekick rights to finally get their proposal for a system of fair time off finalized, and it _cannot_ wait another day for Ben to catch his breath before reviewing it for presentation to the council. (And yes, Ben can appreciate the irony in wanting to catch a break before reviewing the-- yeah. He sees it, which is why he’s trudging up to his office _now,_ instead of sitting in the library like a lovesick idiot waiting for his pack to get out of their exams like he wants to be doing).

All in all, the office isn’t a bad place to be. It’s nice enough, and if he treats it like-- well, kind of like a private nap room, honestly, it’s not going to be the end of the world. He’s the crown prince, and he only uses it for off-label purposes when he’s been up late because of kingdom-adjacent emergencies anyway, so in the grand scheme of things it probably balances out, karma-wise. That’s what Ben tells himself, at least. It’s not like his dad’s office, where there’s a full on couch and pillows in case of overnight or other comfortable furniture emergencies. Ben doesn’t even keep a blanket in there anymore, not after the pictures Audrey took of him sleeping there last year made the gossip rounds.

Ben unlocks the door.

Wait.

He stops dead in the hallway, the door half-open in front of him. He doesn’t usually lock the office door, because there’s nothing important in there that’s not already stored in the double-locked filing cabinet anyway. It’s possible that he did it on autopilot the last time he left without thinking, but that’s not likely.

What’s more concerning than the mysteriously locked door, though, is that there’s somebody already inside. It isn’t something most people would be able to tell from half a step outside the doorway, but Ben _knows._ Curses linger in the blood, despite what fairy promises might say about the reversibility of magic, and Ben can hear whoever it is breathing softly, even from outside.

Based on the way that he’s alive right now, it’s probably safe to assume that the intruder isn’t a threat, or else is an extremely incompetent assassin. Most likely it’s just a student, who saw the empty office and took an opportunity to have a quick breakdown and is now just as freaked as Ben at the unexpected interruption. The door locks from the inside as well as out, so that’s most likely all it is. Just another student.

“Hello?” Ben calls out. He’s not stepping further into the room, just in case it _does_ turn out to be an incompetent assassin and he needs to get out in a hurry, but it’s probably fine. This is fine.

There’s a shuffling sound from the spare chair Ben keeps shoved in the corner for when he gets more than one visitor. It doesn’t happen very often, hence the shoved-in-the-corner-ness. It’s blocked off from the door by the giant wood filing cabinet, which is why Ben can’t see whoever is over there, and also why it makes the most sense as a seating choice if somebody is having a finals-induced panic attack and doesn’t want to be disturbed by idiots walking by.

There’s another faint noise, and then--

“Hey.”

Ben’s heart almost beats out of his chest in the second it takes him to identify that oh, of course it’s not some stranger hiding in his office, it’s one of his VKs.

“Carlos?”

The kid in question nods. “Yeah.” he says quietly. The ‘sorry’ is implied.

“Are you okay?” Ben asks.

He looks-- sad, mostly. He’s kind of tucked up into himself, his arms crossed over his body and his shoulders hunched under his jacket, like maybe he’s cold. Ben revises his original thought. Maybe this is still somebody having a finals-induced breakdown in his office, and it just happens to be one of his kids, because he gave them all permission to use the space weeks ago.

Carlos nods without looking up from the floor and moves closer to Ben in a smooth little side-step that would be almost impressive if he didn’t look so fucking sad about it. He looks-- oh.

“You--” Ben starts, and then stops. It’s pretty obvious what’s going on. Even if he had somehow managed to miss this entire last week of his pack quietly and frantically hoarding things away in the girl’s tower, it’s hard to miss the heat scent filling the room.

Nothing Ben is going to say can really make the situation suck any less, so he might as well fall back on other measures of comfort.

“Can I hug you or will that make things worse?” he asks, opening his arms.

The response he gets is pretty clear. It feels _good,_ the contact, in a way that hugs usually don’t, even with his pack. The magic of human biology, maybe. Or else Ben’s just a sappy idiot who really likes cuddling people. Could be either one, if he’s being honest with himself. He didn’t realize how much he thrives on constant casual contact with other people until he started dating four of them at once. He’s like a sponge, he’s pretty sure, but one of those little egg-shaped ones that just soaks up water and doesn’t show anything until it’s completely full and starts dripping over with it, only instead of water it’s hugs, and Ben will soak them up forever and never feel quite full enough.

Luckily for him, he’s got four people spilling into him now.

“You’re shaking,” Ben notices, after a moment of just clinging together like their lives both depend on it. “Like, kind of a lot?”

Carlos winds his arms tighter around Ben’s waist. It doesn’t do anything to stop the literal full-body tremors that are shaking through him, but it feels nice on Ben’s end, at least.

“I know,” he says, kind of muffled from where he’s pressing his face into Ben’s neck. “It happens.”

Ben’s pretty sure that it’s not supposed to happen, not to most people, but what does he know? Maybe it really is normal, and Ben hasn’t heard of it before because he’s only dated beta girls. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asks, instead of pushing.

“Yeah. I came straight here. No distractions.”

Carlos sounds like he’s okay, so Ben tries to put some of his worry away. “No wolves on the path?” he asks, teasing. It’s mostly a joke, but also a little bit not, after some of the things that people have tried to pull on the VKs in passing.

Luckily, Carlos laughs instead of hitting him. “None, dude.” he says. “You don’t need to worry.”

Ben is pretty sure he does need to worry, like, a lot. He’s kind of a champion worrier. Worrying and waiting, those are the two things he’s good at in life.

Speaking of waiting, he should probably check something really quick before they do anything too distracting. . “Did you text any of the others yet?” Ben asks. “I didn’t see anything in the group chat.”

“Um,” Carlos says. “No?” 

“Carlos!” Ben cries “They’re going to be worried about you!” 

He ducks his head. “They’re fine. It hasn’t been long.”

It’s not going to be fine in a minute, when the girls get out of their exam and try to check up on him and decide to murder Ben with their bare hands for not telling them right away. “I’m going to see where they are.” Ben announces. “Can you hold on while I get my phone out?”

Carlos leans back half an inch, enough that he can get a hand between them, in front of Ben’s chest. “This phone?” he offers, spinning the black-and-blue plastic around his fingers faster than Ben can follow.

“Hey! Let me-- here.” Ben rescues his phone before it inevitably becomes part of the ongoing effort to let Carlos Make As Much Mad-Scientist Shit As Possible. Phones, apparently, have a lot of interestingly fiddly internal bits, and there’s been more than a few losses in the past few months that nobody’s ever managed to _prove_ were the VKs, but did coincide suspiciously well with new mechanical shit appearing in their rooms.

Phone rescued, Ben taps out a quick message to their group chat. It’s a good thing that Evie’s been on their collective ass about keeping their phones on this week, or it’s likely that nobody would look at the chat until the end of exam hours. “Anyone- almost- done- yet-?” he mumbles aloud as he types. There. That’s good enough, shouldn’t send anyone into a panic right before they go into an exam room in case they see it and can’t respond right away. Sufficiently cryptic, without being too much. “There. Sent.” Ben announces.

Carlos is sliding the phone back out of Ben’s hands almost before the message makes the little delivery swoosh. “They’re not done yet.” he says, slipping the phone back into Ben’s right pocket. “Came here for a reason.”

“You came to find me?” Ben asks, although he doesn’t really know why he’s asking. Somewhere small and safe, that locks from the inside, guaranteed to have either nobody or Ben-- it’s an ideal spot to hide out in, if you know that all the other people you trust are too busy to come help out.

Carlos ducks his head in something like a nod. “Mhm.”

Oh, Ben wants to spoil this boy. “Do you want to go back home?” he asks, “I can walk you up to the girl’s room if you want.” It’s the smart thing to do. The girls’ room is set up for this. It’s got water bottles, and food they can eat without leaving, and blankets and stuff that smell like all of them together.

Carlos sighs, which isn’t really an answer.

“Or we could go to my room?” Ben offers. “It’s closer than the girls. I’ve got my key.”

It’s decidedly _not_ the smartest thing they could do. Going to a new place, where they don’t usually hang out, where staff come in fairly regularly without much warning, is probably a bad idea in the long run. It is closer, though, and it means they won’t have to disarm the girl’s locks to get in. Besides, it’s not like they can’t move later, once the girls get out of their exams. Hanging out in Ben’s room for a while isn’t a contract, it’s just—convenience.

“Yeah.” Carols mumbles.

“Yeah, to mine?” Ben pushes. He doesn’t want to get this wrong, not without the others around to course-correct him if he starts to drag things in really the wrong direction.

There’s the incredibly unpleasant sensation of a warm wet tongue licking _inside_ of Ben’s ear, and then Carlos thumps his head down on Ben’s shoulder, going heavy and pliant in his arms. “Yes, okay? I wanna go back to your room. Take me home.”

“Okay!” Ben says. “Okay.” He’s supposed to be the responsible one here, he can do this. “Do you have your stuff, or--”

Carlos makes an annoyed noise and swings his body to the side so that the bag he’s wearing hits Ben in the leg. Ouch. They should probably have another talk after this, once things settle down a bit, about how much it’s socially acceptable to cram into one messenger bag, because seriously, _ouch._

“Right.” Ben says out loud, reassuringly. God, he hopes he sounds half as confident as he’s trying to be right now. “Yeah. Of course. Um. I’m going to get my stuff, okay? And then I’m going to walk you home.”

Carlos nods, eyes closed. “Your home,” he says.

“Yeah. My room.”

For all that he likes to play up being the baby of the group, Carlos is annoyingly perceptive when he wants to be. Like right now, even though he’s the one who Ben is supposed to be taking care of, he’s still trying to play things down, to keep Ben from freaking out more than he already is. He’s keeping it together really well, compared to what Ben remembers from the awful last time he saw the tail end of what a heat does to his body. It’s bad boyfriending, probably, to pop your shaky boyfriend down so you can grab a stack of paperwork, but Ben has a kingdom to think about in addition to a boyfriend, and Carlos is good at dealing with things he doesn’t necessarily like.

“I’m gonna--” Carlos makes a small gesture, rolling his right wrist over and over like he’s searching for words. Downplaying, probably, trying not to freak Ben out. “It’s hitting hard, man. I’m probably gonna go kind of nonverbal once we get there. Don’t freak out.”

Nonverbal doesn’t mean non-communicative. Does it? It probably doesn’t. Mal communicates through cryptic grunts and punching half the time anyway, and if Ben can consistently figure out what she wants, he’s got this, no problem. No worries at all. Nothing to freak out about.

“No freaking out here!” Ben hurries to reassure him. Himself. Whatever. He is absolutely freaking the fuck out. “None. Totally cool.”

Carlos exhales, in what might be a laugh. “Liar.” he whispers. His eyes are closed again, and Ben can’t help but notice the way his dark lashes fan out against his cheek.

“Who, me?” Ben tries, shoving the last of the documents into his backpack. “I’m as honest as they come.”

Carlos laughs for real at that, and hauls himself up when Ben offers an arm. Ben wraps his other arm around Carlos’s waist just in case, which turns out to be a good idea when he misjudges the next step and almost trips over into the filing cabinet.

“You gonna be good for the walk over?” Ben asks, worried. He shouldn’t be, probably. The VKs know how to take care of each other, and if they haven’t dropped everything to run off again this month, they must be sure that it’s okay. Besides, Carlos chose to come here, instead of going up to the girl’s room on his own, and that’s got to mean something. For all that he's good at looking cute and just convincing people to give in to whatever he wants, he does actually know how to take care of himself.

Sure enough, Carlos nods. “Mm-hm.” he mumbles “S’fine.”

Ben lets go so that he can shoulder his backpack on properly. “Sure?” he asks, even though he knows the answer.

Sure enough. “Yep.” Carlos says. “M’done with finals. Finished early today. Wouldn’a pushed through otherwise.” His tone leaves an implied _of course, stupid,_ but it’s nice of him not to say that part out loud. It makes Ben feel a little better about the whole thing.

Ben nudges the office door closed behind them, pushing his boyfriend out of the way so he can dig the key out of his pocket. “Me too,” he says. Reassuring. “I mean, I finished today, too.”

Carlos brightens up at that. God, it’s probably at least partially just biology that’s making Ben want to scoop him up and keep him forever, but he’s just too cute like this. “Cool!” he says. “You c’n stay for real then, yeah?”

Ben almost drops the key. “Yes! Yeah. If you still want. I can wait for the others if that’s better. Or whatever.”

“Nice.” Carlos sucks in a deep breath once they're well and truly out of the tiny office. “You should stay now.” he says, still breathing in deep and out slow, like he does when he’s trying not to space out.

Ben’s got to notice things like this, because if he doesn’t, nobody else will either, and they’ll end up with another Creature Anatomy fiasco. If Ben had gotten his way with that one, Professor Azaria would have been fired. Ignoring student drama is understandable, because if every teacher followed up about every single student breakup or roommate conflict things would be absolutely unbearable but missing the fact that one of your students doesn’t talk in class because the way you yell at your advanced classes to “do better” freaks him out so bad he can’t concentrate for the rest of class isn’t acceptable.

They got the cheating infractions dropped eventually, but it took a lot of convincing, and a lot of Ben stepping in, and it would have been easier if Professor Azaria had just thought for a moment in the first place and realized that just maybe, there are reasons other than cheating that a student might not perform well in class despite turning in technically perfect homework. The disaster had ended up with all of the VKs getting standing weekly sessions with the school’s counselors, so the situation hadn’t been a total loss, but it’s also not something that Ben wants to repeat, ever. It’s easier just to stay on top of things before they become issues. Talk about everything beforehand, open lines of communication, and all that. Ben’s been trying really hard to notice when his pack isn’t talking about things lately, and it’s been-- scary, mostly. Educational, too, and a great motivation to push harder for Isle reforms and bringing over more kids, but not in a way that feels good. Mostly just in a way that makes Ben want to change his stance on violence as an answer to problem solving.

Anyway.

Home, that’s their first goal. Good decisions are not something that happens while standing in a hallway, and Mal will probably agree with him on that. They need to get home, and find the others, and then they can figure the rest out from there. They should probably also figure out where Dude is, actually. There’s a lot of things that Carlos doesn’t like, but he’s at least twice as likely to not be a brat about them if he’s got the little dog with him. It’s not top priority, obviously, but Ben makes a mental note to text one of the others about it once they’re on that step.

So. Home, pack, dog. Three clear goals. Ben can handle this. “Is there anything I need to know?” Ben asks, just in case he’s missing something obvious. “Anything I can do while we wait for the others?”

Carlos tilts his head, considering. He’s looking a little steadier now that they’re out of the small office space. “The others’re gonna push water the whole time once they catch up, so you don’t need to worry about that.” he says, linking arms with Ben. “I don’t always wanna eat, during, but s’never been a problem. Just want touch, really, so s’long as you’ve got like, some point of contact, s’gonna go fine.”

Okay. Ben’s got this. Offer water, but don’t worry too much about it, and touch the hell out of his boyfriend. “What kind of touch?” he asks, just in case he’s missing something important. They’ve talked boundaries before, but sometimes things get weird, and he wants to be sure of this one. It’s another one of the boyfriending rules, no touching without reasonable precedent and-slash-or enthusiastic consent.

Carlos rubs a hand over his face. “Right.” he says, slowly. “Yeah. Usual rules are still a go. I might get extra cuddly, but it doesn’t mean anything. Just the heat talking. If you wanna strip down to shorts it’s fine, but any touching, you know, outside the lines and I’m out.”

Okay. That’s-- really reasonable, actually. “Okay,” Ben says, mostly to reassure himself. “Okay.”

Carlos leans against him, but in a friendly sort of way. Like he would smack him if they weren’t already dealing with everything. “Seriously, just don’t try any shit we haven’t done before and you’ll be good.” he says, all warm and small and solid against Ben.

“I know.” Ben says. “My issues, sorry.” He’s a little bit sorry. A lifetime of being taught how to be in charge means he always needs to know what’s happening, and if he won’t be able to get the verbal rundown while they’re in the moment, he needs parameters to work within.

“S’cool, really. Been thinking about this for a minute, dude.”

“I know. Do you want--” Ben stops. Maybe it’s the wrong thing to ask. Like not talking about your exes, or something. Don’t talk about pack members who aren’t here yet, not when they’re on a weird time-crunch timeline and don’t know when they’ll be able to get together yet. Or, wait, shit. Maybe this is the wrong thing entirely, and oh fuck, Ben really isn’t equipped to deal with this, what if this isn’t close enough to the end of finals, and everyone really does need to be here, and it’s not as okay as it seems, and they should be going to the infirmary instead? What if he’s getting everything wrong? 

Carlos jabs a bony elbow into Ben’s side. He was talking, right. Yeah. It’s annoying to just stop in the middle of a thought. Ben should really know better. Do better. Oh, geez.

“What?” Carlos demands. “Whaddya wanna know?”

“Do you want anything from the girl’s room? I know, like, familiar is supposed to be better?”

“Oh.” Carlos stops, jerking Ben to a halt by the arm, where they’re still linked together. “Yeah. I prob’ly will, at some point. We can send the girls once--” he shakes his head hard before picking up again. “--once they’re done.”

Ben wants to do right by this kid so badly. “You sure?” he asks just in case this is another case where one of his partners is trying to be easy and ignore the things that they want, even though it would be really easy for him to do and would make them super happy, even if they don’t technically _need_ it. “I can swing by. It’s not like their room is super far away.”

Carlos ducks his head a little bit. “Uh. If you wanna.” he mumbles.

Ben doesn’t know what that means. “Do you want me to?” he pushes “I can get whatever you need, seriously. Just say the word, man, and I’m on it.”

Carlos shakes his head. No. He doesn’t want Ben to leave, or else the potential consequences of Ben leaving are greater than the potential benefit of him going to get stuff from the girl’s room. Or maybe he’s just feeling contrary, or doesn’t want to have to bother disarming the girl’s locks, or talk Ben through disarming them, or-- There’s a lot of things it could mean, is the point.

“I’ll stay here, then.” Ben tries. “Is that okay?”

Carlos jerks his head up in a shaky kind of nod. Okay. He wants Ben to stay close, then. That’s something he can do. “Anything else I should know, or is that it?” Ben asks.

One shoulder lifts. Unsure? Ben’s getting better at reading body language, but he really needs to know for sure that he’s not going to fuck anything up in a major way.

“Can you just tell me?” Ben says “Please? Just a yes-or-no. Anything else I’m going to mess up until the others get here?”

That gets a response out of Carlos, a violent head shake so quick that it almost startles Ben. No. No-no-no. He’s doing something with his hand too, one of the small, distinct gestures that the rest of the pack hasn’t taught Ben yet. Thumb and pinky out, moving it from his hip, just a little bit. It’s not _no,_ because Ben recognizes that one now, and it’s not _stop_ either, but it’s pretty clear that this line of questions isn't working. Carlos is visibly upset, and Ben feels like a shithead for not being able to understand why, exactly, and they still aren’t home and it’s not really safe to stop here, and it’s awful, seeing your pack hurting and not knowing how to fix it.

“Okay!” Ben says, instead of pushing more, and it’s too loud, too much. Carlos startles, pulling _hard_ at Ben’s arm where they’re holding on to each other. Damnit. His pack is so skittish about certain things still, Ben _knows_ that. His boys get jumpy when people start yelling, and he should know better than to raise his voice when Carlos is already keyed up and sensitive. “I’m not going anywhere,” he says, softer. “I’m here, okay? I’m not going away.”

That gets a nod. Good. Staying close, that’s something Ben can do. “I’m gonna just--” he tries, and pulls forward, leading Carlos by the arm they’ve got linked together, even through whatever that was. He follows, thank _god_ , moving easily along beside Ben. It’s easier than leading him when he’s got his face in a book, if Ben’s being honest. Less resistance.

They don’t run into anyone else on the way back to Ben’s rooms. Small mercies, but Ben will take whatever they can get at this point. Accidents have happened before, with people going off their hormone control, or late bloomers, or people who just respond badly to medication. Accidents happen, but most of the time it works out fine and there’s no need to worry, even though Ben is really, really good at worrying. They’re not taking any extra risks if he can help it, and if Ben is being cautious, it probably means the rest of their pack is going a little bit insane.

Actually. On second thought the rest of his pack is absolutely insane, no going about it. Sane people don’t take finals when they’re going into full-blown heat, no matter what kind of plans they have in place for after.

Ben gets his door unlocked on the first try, which is great. Perfect.

Carlos pushes inside before Ben can get the key fully out of the lock, which is, okay, a little bit less than perfect. There’s been some ongoing communication—not issues, exactly, but snags. Things that end with people sleeping in their own rooms, and not because they’re trying to stay on top of their finals. Because they’re mad at each other. And it’s maybe-sometimes-usually nobody’s _fault,_ really, but it’s not the most fun thing in the world, trying to figure out what went wrong. Which open nerves got touched the wrong way. And okay, Ben isn’t an expert or anything, but he’s pretty sure that today especially, he didn’t just manage to touch a nerve. Swung a shovel, maybe.

Door. Lock. Bolt. He can’t keep the staff out forever, but maybe by the time they have to come in, he’ll have the others here. Mal can run interference against anyone, and Evie and Jay are the best at charming people into doing what they want and not getting in trouble for it, so as long as they can figure something out until the others get here, it’s going to work out.

As long as Ben can talk his boyfriend… .out of hiding in the bathroom.

Well.

Ben opens his phone, just in case one of the others is free after all and has advice to offer. There’s a notification dot blinking on the group chat, which is promising, at least.

**VKs All Day (group mms)**

He scrolls back up to his last message.

Benny Boo  
_anyone almost done yet_

Eves <3  
_not yet :((  
waiting with @ dragon bae for history to start :(( _

Well. There goes that plan. Right before an exam is pretty much the worst possible time Ben could have picked to try and bother the girls. He and Carlos can cope on their own for an hour and a half, probably. That’s fine. They can do this. Ben taps in a reply.

Benny Boo  
_K._

Eves <3  
_Wait why??  
@ BENNY BOO WHY??? _

Ben means to send her a reply, he really does. It’s just that sometimes, boyfriends who are small and sad and _right there_ are more interesting to pay attention to than phones.

_Read at 12:52 pm._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a fic tumblr now! Find me at [thebluestbluewords](https://thebluestbluewords.tumblr.com/) dot tumblr dot com if you wanna talk about fic and dcoms and maybe see some extra stuff??


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, section breaks are something that comes from the heart, not the plot.
> 
> Chapter warnings: Food issues come up a bit in this one, (not very explicitly, but more so than in past chapters I think??), there’s a mention of dicks but again nothing explicit, and if you are particularly bothered by discussions of anxiety (again, written by someone who has an anxiety disorder and is very much writing from personal experience) this one might be a little rough in places. Also, this isn’t in the tags for this particular installment of my ongoing nonsense, but there’s some discussion of aspec stuff and how that comes into play in a multi person relationship.

Jay leaves the testing room running mostly on autopilot.

Fucking math. Fucking geometry. Fucking bullshit texting exemptions that mean he’s stuck away from the others. Fucking-- test blocking. Stupid bullshit time blocks, running exams through lunch.

Stupid.

He’s tired, and hungry, and alone. Two of those things he can fix easily, and his last final is scheduled for tomorrow, so the third one won’t be so hard either. Food comes first, then company, and then sleep. With his math exam over and done with, Jay’s pretty sure he’ll be able to pass out as soon as he gets back to the room.

Food is more important than sleep though. The dining hall would usually be closed by this hour, but out of respect for the bizarre stress period that is finals week at Auradon Prep, and also so that the people in special testing blocks aren’t the only ones stuck in the off-blocks, the dining hall is open for weird hours this week.

Which is cool, because it means Jay gets to eat, but also kind of sucks, because it takes out one of his better study spots. It’s easier for him to concentrate when he’s not surrounded by the aura of like, a million other people freaking out over not knowing what the fuck happened with the magic treatise of the mid-century. And sure, yeah, he could work on turning off the way his magic wants to automatically read other people’s emotions, but where’s the fun in that? It’s cool as hell to know what other people are feeling, and even cooler to be able to blast a little bit of his own feelings back at them. It’s nothing like what Mal can do, but it’s still better than not having magic at all, even when it means taking in the emotions of a whole school of panicked Auradon brats freaking out about what they’re going to do if they fail their finals. It’s nice to get the magical vibe check on people, but it’d be even cooler if he could have a little bit more control over who and when he gets the vibes from. He’s been practicing with Mal and the others when they get a chance, but it’s hard, and it gets harder when he’s tired. Or hungry.

So. Lunch first, then tracking down the others. That feels like a solid enough plan. 

Jay heads upstairs, past the suit of armor with the fuckoff-huge mace thing (a morning star, the part of his mind that’s been paying attention in kingdom history supplies.), through the main entry, which still has entirely too many random dumb knicknacks laying around. Someone could pawn that shit, easy. Who thought it was a good idea to keep a bowl of golden goose eggs as a loose decoration in a school of idiot teenagers? Aside from the resale and straight-up materials value, it’s also dumb to assume that people won’tjust throw them at each other for the hell of it. Freshmen probably end up concussed every year and Auradon just writes it off as the cost of learning for the others. 

Fuckers. 

Jay shoves through the double doors at the end of the entrance hall. It’s not as crowded as it was maybe an hour ago, when the main testing block got out, but okay, wow. Walking into the dining hall hurts.

He doesn’t make a sound, because he’s better than that. He’s got his reactions under control, baybee. No pain no gain, or some shit like that. He can walk right in, no problem, like there’s not even a whole cluster of students sitting right by the door who are working on some kind of… chem exam, maybe? Something with a lot of numbers, something that hurts to even pick up on. It’s only a vague awareness, like walking into a room where the light is slightly too bright, but built up between the cluster of four, five people, it hurts.

A step further into the room isn’t better. The hot food line is over by the far wall, on the opposite side from the doors. They’re tables in the way, a whole bunch of them still full of people hunched over books or staring down into coffee cups with hopeless expressions.

Okay. Build a wall. One brick at a time. Cinder blocks, yeah. Make it look just like home. Industrial warehouse  _ chic,  _ that’s the stuff. Block out the girl who’s had so much caffeine she’s practically bleeding excess energy, wall off the guy who’s literally in tears over there. Fuck, that’s a long range for tears to be projected. Jay glances over at the kid. It’s a freshman, someone who’s been coming by the gym to do warmups with the swords and shields team. He’s a good kid, he’s totally got…. a name, that Jay knows, and he’s got a sister who plays at college, and okay, that’s why he’s picking up on him so strongly. It’s way worse when he knows the people. It’s fine when it’s his pack, because they’ve got their own whatever the fuck it is, magic system worked out between Mal and Evie that keeps them in their own heads most of the time, and they’re not so bad about projecting their shit out into the world besides that, but some of these Auradon kids bleed emotions like it’s fucking  _ nothing. _

Ouch. Okay, walls up, right. Lunch, fuck yeah. Everything’s better when he’s not hungry. And there’s even a seat open back by the weird little corner pocket, hell yes. Less foot traffic over there, so even without his crew around, Jay might actually get to relax for like, a singular second while he’s eating. Hell yeah. Things might not be totally awful after all.

Okay. Plate down, walls up, cool. Phone out and on the table, because hm. That’s. Yeah. A bad brain buzz right there. A pack-specific kinda buzz, now that it’s not being completely overwhelmed by the general bad-finals-feelings coming from everyone in the room and also his own head.

Fuck.

It’d sure be nice to have some kind of magic support system. The wall thing works well enough most of the time, but Jay is fucking  _ tired  _ today, so it’s harder to keep them up. And sure, he was up late fucking around on the heavy bags with Mal last night, but she’s the one who suggested it, so it’s really her fault that he’s just catching up with their whole text chat now. She doesn’t even have to suffer for it, the little killer, because her exams don’t last  _ forever  _ to make up for the fact that everyone in the room with her is a little bit fucked up. Even though Mal’s more fucked up than anyone.

The bad brain buzz is still there, even with his mental walls up. It’s not the most familiar one, which feels like a stinging mouthful of smoke sucked up too fast, and comes when Mal is too pissed to remember her shields, but it has a distinct flavor to it. Kind of sharp, like stepping outside a cold day. 

Aw, shit. It  _ is  _ familiar, damnit. Jay thumbs open his phone and flicks through to the group chat. It’s-- not the best thing he’s ever read. Cryptic fucking messages about not worrying are never a good thing. The feeling isn’t the worst, though, and if Evie and Mal are still in an exam, it’s not worth freaking out on them and potentially making them snap. Better to stay calm. 

**VKs All Day (group mms)**

JJ   
_ done for the day!!!  _ _   
_ _ anyone got eyes on @ COD _

Eves <3   
_ NO?????? _ _   
_ _ HE WAS WITH YOU???? _

Well then. Evie sure isn’t going along with the whole not-panicking plan. Also, she’s supposed to be in an exam right now. Jay’s usually all in favor of lying to people, but now doesn’t seem like the right time. If Evie can get through her midterms using a technically-illegal magical object to store her notes, she’s probably fine to do a little under-the-table texting in the name of staying up to date with whatever the hell is going on with their pack. 

JJ   
_ no????? _ _   
_ _ he finished early??? _

Benny Boo   
_ come to mine when you’re done _ _   
_ _ at everyone  _ _   
_ _ but esp at JJ  _ _   
  
_

Cool. That’s probably fine.. Evie’s going to flip, but if she’s already freaked anyway there’s nothing short of actually seeing them safe that’s going to calm her down. Jay flips over to his direct message chat with Ben, rather than bother the girls any more. He’s got a decent idea of the shape of things (Probably. It’s not that hard to figure out. They’ve been running together for ages, the four of them, and the whole magic-sensitivity thing is making things a little bit easier to figure out) but it’s probably worth checking out the feeling in a chat that isn’t going to make Evie lose her mind later. 

**txt to: Ben** **  
** _ru ok_ _  
_ _need backup_ _  
__?_

It’s a little bit hard to type out the message with one hand, but isle habits die harder, and he’s not leaving his plate unguarded without the others around. If Ben is freaking out, it probably means that he and Carlos are both okay. Ben’s a solid dude, even though he’s got his own issues sometimes, and Carlos is fully capable of taking care of himself if he needs to. Jay trusts him to like, tackle Ben and sit on him, or whatever. He’s an isle kid and a little asshole besides, so they’ll figure something out. If it were really an emergency they’d just be dealing with it instead of texting the group chat, so they’re definitely okay. 

It’s probably worth sending another check-in anyway. 

**txt to: C** **  
** _ hey _ _   
_ _ u with ben _

“What’s up, man?”

Jay does not jump. He’s got the magic, baybee. He’s situationally-fucking-aware. “Hey.” he says, instead of bothering to come up with something clever. 

Trev, who is on the tourney team and is usually not an asshole unless it’s against another team, sits down without an invitation, because maybe he’s a little bit of an asshole sometimes. “We missed you earlier, man!” he says, reaching out to whack Jay’s shoulder. “We went by your room, but you must’ve been out or something. Finals hitting you hard?”

Jay doesn’t have time for this. He’s got fucking things to do, people to see, girls to talk down from murder, probably, if things are going like he thinks they are. 

“Yeah.” he says shortly. “For sure.” 

“That exam for Bowman right? It was killer. I’ll bet you I missed half the questions. Like, those ones on the second fairy treatise? Totally outta line.” 

“No bet.” Jay says, actively scrolling through his social media feeds. Take the hint, come on, man.

Trev leans in closer. “Aw, come on. Is it the academics thing? I’ll bet you outta eight that I won’t drink this bottle of ketchup.”

Jay can accept not wanting to take a hint and leave someone alone, but messing up the rules of Odds Are and trying to name your own dare is taking things too far. “No deal.” he says, flat. “That’s not how the fuckin’ game works.” 

“Aww, come on.”

Come on is right. Respond to the fucking text, guys. “No, man.” Jay says again. “I have stuff I need to do.”

“Chicken,” says Trev, standing up, fucking  _ finally.  _

“Yeah, you know me.” Jay tells him, even though he’s only half listening. It’s fine, whatever. It’s not like it’s hard to make it up to most of the guys. Offer to share notes, or partner up on speed drills, or whatever, and they’re cool again. 

“Fine, fine.” Trev says, getting up to go for real. “See you later though, yeah? Tonight?”

Jay doesn’t know what’s supposed to be happening tonight, but he also doesn’t care. He’ll either be there or he won’t, and he’s already going to have to make it up to the team for not being around earlier, so he’s finding it a little hard to care about whatever’s happening tonight. “Sure, maybe.” Jay says, glancing down at his phone. 

Fucking _ finally _ a text notification pops up.

“See you around, man.” his dumbass teammate calls even as he’s walking out of Jay’s range.

“Yeah, see you later.” Jay calls after him, because even though he doesn’t really care about what one teammate thinks of him, it never hurts to have those connections there for when you need them later on. Easier to get favors out of people when they think you’re not an irredeemable asshole, something Mal  _ still  _ doesn’t seem to get. 

It doesn’t matter. Pack is a lot more important than random students, and now that it’s been a minute, there’s a text waiting and a lot more coming in. 

**txt from: Ben** **  
** _please_ _yea_ _  
_ _we’re fine nobody is dead or bleeding but like_ _  
_ _I don’t know what to do_ _  
_ _we’re in my room the side door is unlocked_

Jay is up on his feet almost before he makes a conscious decision to move. Maybe he’s a little more keyed up than he thought. Ben’s using “we”, which means yeah, he’s with Carlos, which is fine. They’re okay. There’s no need to panic. 

Still, moving a little faster can’t hurt. 

JJ   
_ lock that shit _ _   
_ _ I’ll get in anyway. _ _   
_ _ it’ll help like 4 real _ __

It’s not like locking the doors is going to make a difference in how easily Jay can get in, and it’ll probably help dissolve some of the static-y brain feeling that’s coming through. Carlos and Mal (and okay, Evie too. It’s an isle kid thing) like to hide when they get upset, and even though locking the doors isn’t going to stop any self-respecting isle kid from getting in somewhere, it’s usually enough to keep the Auradon brats out of the way and give that little extra feeling of safety. 

Ben:   
_ okay  _ _   
_ _ anything else I can do  _

There’s really not, but saying that isn’t going to help anything. Jay shoulders open the door, trying to decide if it’s worth it to hop the stairs and risk getting yelled at. 

JJ    
_ :knife knife knife: _

Nah. Speed walking is probably fine. 

Ben   
_:(((_ _  
__no murder today_ _  
_ _this is genuinely super weird please_

Fuck. Reading tone is hard through text, but the buzzy feeling that’s been chiming in the back of Jay’s head is getting a little bit sharper. It’s not full-out painful yet, but it’s getting way more intense. They haven’t really tried outright communication through the magic connection yet, because as Mal’s spell book says, anything with mind-to-mind communication has a huge chance of going catastrophically wrong really fast, but if this isn’t a feeling that’s being thrown to him, Jay’s sure salt will be glowing next. 

JJ   
_on it frfr_ _  
__gimme like 5 i’m on my way_

The response comes in fast. 

Ben   
_ tytyty _

It’s easy enough to pop the lock on Ben’s door open. Auradon prep is really big into the idea that students should be able to trust each other, and as part of that, all the dorms have really shitty locks that barely even take a pick to open. A toddler with a hairpin could open this shit, for real. Mal and Evie have an electronic lock on the inside of their door now, and Jay and Carlos have an alarm that sounds like a kid screaming bloody murder. It’s almost  _ more _ effective than a real lock, because they used Mal’s voice for the scream and anything that makes Mal scream like that is enough to send the rest of the floor running for cover. They’ve been trying to convince Ben to let them put a better lock on his door too, but he’s got some weird idea about like, school regulations and shit, and he hasn’t done it yet. 

Oh, shit. Jay knocks, almost as an afterthought. Bursting in unannounced probably isn’t the best idea he’s ever had. Ben is probably enough to stall the worst of the things that they’ve come up with, but leaving their mad scientist unhappy and alone is a recipe for disaster, especially for people who barge into a seemingly safe space unannounced. 

“Yeah!” someone calls. “Come in!” 

That’s Ben. “Help is here,” Jay calls back. “As requested, your royalness—”

He doesn’t even have the door open all the way before a warm body makes abrupt, almost painful contact. How Carlos manages to hit so solid when he’s such a little guy, Jay is never going to understand. It’s an effort not to stagger back under the unexpected weight of a whole person clinging to him, but he manages it, and gets them both inside and upright without letting go, and oh,  _ hell  _ does it feel good to be touching each other. 

It’s like-- 

There’s not really words to describe how it feels. Jay could try, maybe, but it’d end up being worse than those stupid introspective poetry assignments they got in basic chivalry. It feels  _ good,  _ in a way that nothing else does. Like this is how they’re meant to be. Fit together like this, touching up and down and connected in the back of Jay’s head, the static gone now, replaced with a comfortable hum of-- not happiness, but something a little bit like it. Something that’s not  _ fear-unhappy-need  _ anymore. 

Carlos is kind of shaking, but that’s cool, that’s something that just happens sometimes. He’s not wearing his jacket, so Jay takes the opportunity to run his hands over Carlos’s bare arms, taking a second to linger at his pulse points, digging his fingers in just a little. It feels so good to have the direct points of contact that Jay is almost tempted to stop for longer, but there’s certain things that he knows will feel even better on the other side of the connection, so he moves on. 

One arm down around his hip to keep them pulled together, as much body contact as possible, and then Jay’s other hand goes up to tangle in the short little curls at the base of Carlos’s neck. There’s something that’s extra fuckin’  _ intimate  _ about being allowed to touch somewhere that could also be used to hurt, and it sets off some kind of crazy brain sparks for both of them. They don’t talk about this a ton, because Carlos  _ hates  _ it, but they’ve talked a little bit about the things that work best, and touching his neck and hair is basically a straight trip to the better side of the whole biological fuckery thing. 

Fuck, it’s good to see him safe. 

Jay moves his hand through the sweaty curls, catching, pulling just a little bit. “You freaked us the fuck out, furball.” he tells Carlos, probably too quietly. Ben is here, and he’s gotta be freaked too, and it’s his room and all, but Jay just needs a second. Just long enough to get a read on things, and then he can manage both panicked boyfriends. “You’re a menace, you know that?”

Carlos nods. No words. Okay, then. 

“You’re okay?” Jay asks, real quiet, probably too soft for Ben to hear. and he might not answer, but--

“Yeah.”

It’s not much more than a whisper, but that’s fine. Talking is a good sign. “Sure?” Jay asks again, just in case. 

Carlos nods against his shoulder. “Yeah. S’good.”

Good. That’s a loaded word for sure, but it’s descriptive enough for now. “Ben’s good?”

Shrug. They’re clinging together pretty hard, so it’s easy to feel the little hand wobble that Carlos does at the question. Shifting the pressure from the top edge of his hand down to the bottom, and back again. 

“He’s trying. S’okay. It’d be better with everyone.” Carlos says, almost too soft to be heard. 

No shit this would be better with everyone. The whole point of human brains is to promote pack bonding. They’re supposed to be together. Mal is probably going to flip her shit when she finds out that this is how things are shaking out. 

“Yeah.” Jay says. “Well. We’re working on that.” 

+++ 

Ben is doing his best. 

He’s-- okay. He’s trying, and that should count for something. He got another person here, and that’s about what he’s capable of, because as it turns out, royal status and caring a whole lot doesn’t do shit when you’ve got a boyfriend who is apparently  _ losing his mind.  _

Ben’s been through human biology classes! He’s watched all the slides, done the unit where they talk about the crazy brain stuff that happens when alphas or omegas hit a certain point in their cycle and get this whole mess, but as it turns out, reading about how heats work and actually experiencing one are totally different things and it’s definitely _not_ beautiful or peaceful or whatever else the tutor in eighth grade had told them. It’s sure as heck not sexy, like the general student body seems to think. Seeing one of his boyfriends intensely uncomfortable is never going to be fun for Ben, no matter how good it feels on his end to try and make him feel less awful. It’s just weird mostly, and in between being the _weirdest fucking thing that Ben has ever experienced,_ it’s been a quiet, lowkey kind of nice. 

It’s probably not supposed to be this weird. There’s the whole thing with being split off from the rest of their pack, and the residual just-got-out-of-finals stress that’s probably still doing a number on them both. It’s gonna get better, Ben’s sure of it, but it’s still freaky to see Carlos all out of his own head like this. He had cried in front of Ben, on purpose even. And not just to get something. For-real tears, gross snotty ones that Ben hadn’t been able to stop by giving in or waiting for the teacher who caught them this time to leave. (Crying on command is never something that Ben thought would be a useful life skill, but as it turns out, when you’re short and cute and able to burst into anxious tears the second it looks like you’re going to face consequences for your actions, it’s pretty useful.) 

But. It’s going to be fine now, with maybe-hopefully no more of Ben watching his boyfriend cry and not being able to do anything about it, because even though he’s been trying to offer touch and comfort, he’s not three other people, and there’s only so much he can do to make up for that fact. 

Maybe now two people can be a better replacement for three. 

If Ben’s being honest, he still feels weird watching Jay and Carlos cling to each other like this. It feels too personal, like something he shouldn’t be watching. He’s been with the VKs for almost three months now, seen them asleep and naked, seen most of them cry, seen them tired and happy and scared out of their minds that he’s going to hate them or send them back to the nightmare island they had just escaped, but this fully clothed, conscious moment feels more intimate than that. 

They’re whispering something to each other, lower than Ben can hear. Oddly, this is what makes him turn away. The little nod that Carlos gives, half buried against Jay’s shoulder, that’s what makes his face burn. He’s shared a bed with both of them, for fuck’s sake, and it still feels wrong not to look away, to give them this moment alone together.

It takes a long moment, and then they disengage, somehow, without really releasing each other. It’s less of a physical thing, and more of a-- shift, somehow, in body language. They’re still wrapped around each other, but it feels less like something that Ben shouldn’t be seeing, and more like the usual easy, constant contact that happens whenever any of Ben’s pack is together.

Jay shifts around so that Carlos is tucked against his side, and holds his newly freed hand out to Ben. “Hey, man. Are you holding up okay?”

“I-- me?” Ben stutters out. “Yeah?” He’s almost forgotten that he has a physical body, actually. It’s weird, to feel like he’s the least important one in the room, but it’s not necessarily bad. Kind of interesting, considering how tuned-in he was to his body a few minutes ago. Is this another pack thing, he wonders, or just some weird response to being started out of the still place where he was before Jay came in. It really doesn’t feel bad, which is still odd. Ben feels a little bit cold, all on his own like this, but not like he felt whenever he saw Audrey flirting with other guys. It’s not a full-body shiver of discomfort, just a physical sensation, because hey, he doesn’t have a hot body plastered against his side anymore. “I’m-- I’m good.” he finishes. He is, probably. He’s reasonably sure of it.

Jay tilts his head, like he knows Ben isn’t saying everything. He’s good at reading people, way better than Mal, and less likely than the girls are to just let things go. “You sure?” he asks, lightly. “I know it’s weird. Probably weirder for you, not growing up with this and all.”

Ben shakes his head. He really is fine. It’s an adjustment, is all, going from being the voice of reason to the new guy again. That’s all. It’s like a release of pressure, not having to be the one who’s with it all the time. “No, yeah, I’m fine. Are you guys, uh, do you need anything?”

Jay glances down. “I think we’re good now, right C?”

Ben can’t see exactly, but he’s reasonably sure that Carlos makes some kind of small movement, one of the hand gestures that he hasn’t learned yet, even though he sees the others using them all the time. Jay gets whatever it is, that’s the important thing. It doesn’t really matter that Ben’s still out of the loop on this. It’s fine.

Jay shoots a grin over at Ben. He really is unfairly gorgeous. “We’re good,” he says, looking all soft and touchable and-- fuck.

Ben wants to join them, to touch again, but more than that he wants to keep his pack comfortable (god, it’s like a compulsion, like when he tried the courage shots that Doug bought off his cousins one summer, and every bad idea felt like something he just  _ had  _ to do.) More than touch, he needs to make sure that they’re okay.

“Should I do anything?” he asks, even though he’s pretty sure he knows the answer, and it’s just to be here. “We were just kind of chilling on the bed, but I can do whatever, go wherever you need me--”

Carlos cuts Ben off with a little rumbly growl. It would be adorable, under any other circumstances. It’s kind of adorable anyway. Like one of those little forest cats, the ones that you know full well can rip your head off, but they’re just so cute that you can’t help but think maybe it would be worth it to pet one, just once, and accept that you’re going to lose a hand in the attempt.

Maybe it does work like cats, and the whole growling thing (it’s weird, Ben’s never felt somebody else’s growl like this before, resonating in his own chest like this) is some kind of crazy comfort-healing thing. That would fit with what Evie’s been telling him about pack dynamics, actually. How it’s all about comfort and closeness, and anything else is social norms being projected onto a biological process that isn’t inherently sexual until it’s interpreted by a society that wants to sexualize every possible behavior.

“Uh--” Ben starts, and then, oh, he’s being grabbed by his collar before he can share the thought that maybe purring is a cool thing that humans should try more often, and Carlos is shoving him and Jay both towards Ben’s bed. This is cool too. Totally cool. Ben is so down for more touching.

Ben gets put on the side furthest from the door, facing inwards. His papers, somehow, seem to magically appear at his feet without any kind of effort on his part. Jay gets shoved down on the other side, closer to the door, and Carlos seats himself in the middle, with his back against the wall and his bulging messenger bag pulled up close so that he can dig through it in search of some critically important thing.

The thing turns out to be an outdated, clearly pieced-together game system that Ben is fairly sure was popular around the time he was learning to walk. There’s a pile of game cartridges in the side pocket of the bag, which spill out across the bed like little glossy plastic tiles when Carlos tips it over. They look like pieces of some imagined whole, where if only Ben could scoop enough of them up, he’d be able to finish the puzzle. Ben doesn’t catch a glimpse of the chosen game before it’s snatched up, and the rest of the pieces are swept back into their designated compartment again. That’s always how it’s been going, recently. Ben will think that finally, he’s got a chance to figure out all the pieces, and then just before he can try and guess what he’s supposed to do with them, they’re hidden again. Evie tells him about wearing mascara when she was a toddler, and then before Ben can say anything, she’s moving on to how even back then she was better at applying it than the girls in 6C, and it turns into a chance for Mal to jump in too and complain about their neighbors. Just when Ben thinks he’s going to find out  _ why  _ Jay doesn’t want to learn to swim (and there’s got to be a reason, he’s slipped out of about four chances to learn now, and if it weren’t important, he’d just say it), he gets called away with royal duties and they have to put it off another day. It’s maddening, constantly being shown glimpses of the things that his pack doesn’t know how to talk about, and having to wait patiently for them to be ready on their own time, instead of trying to force his way in.

It’s a bit like doing a puzzle in the dark, when you can’t see half the pieces and the pieces that you do have don’t seem to go together, and the light (so  _ close,  _ it keeps swinging closer, but it’s an oil lamp and if you grab for it it’ll burn you for sure and maybe go out completely) keeps moving away so all you get is glimpses of the whole. It’s even more maddening because Ben  _ knows  _ that the whole thing is there, and it’s going to be  _ so good  _ once they figure this out. He’s sure it’s going to be incredible, in a way that’s going to change not just him, but the very world they live in.

There’s a blip as the game system starts up. Ben should probably pay attention to his work, get stuff done, and let his boyfriends have a minute to themselves without him being needy all over them, but then the game startup music kicks in, and Ben can’t help himself.

“Is that  _ Creature Intersection?”  _ he asks. He’s rewarded with a little tilt of the screen, so that he can see the loading animation. It’s totally Creature Intersection. Nailed it.

Carlos still isn’t talking, apparently, but Jay leans over to see the screen too. He laughs. “This is like, the chillest game you’ve got for this thing, right dude?” he says, bumping Carlos with an elbow as he leans over to see. “I didn’t know you were carrying it around.”

Carlos shows his teeth in something like a grin. He likes being underestimated, so he’s probably pleased to hear it, even if he’s not going to give some snarky, clever response like usual.

Ben reaches over to tap the back of the console. It’s sturdier than he expected, considering the way it looks. There’s a conspicuous joining seam across the back of the game, but even there, it doesn’t feel fragile, just a little bit bumpy from the obvious repair job where the shiny white half meets the glossy red of the other part. Ben’s a little bit amazed that enough broken game systems even made it over to the Isle, but apparently there were at least three of them, considering the color spread on Carlos’s franken-game.

“Woah. I didn’t know the game even worked with this kind of console.” Ben says softly, kind of impressed despite himself.

Jay laughs. “Oh, it didn’t,” he says. “C rigged this one up to play games from like, what, the next three or four generations?”

Carlos flashes three fingers in front of the screen. Just three, then. Still.

Jay jostles him into Ben in a way that’s probably meant to be loving. “Oh, just three?” he says, teasing. “Gotta get on that, then. I want Extreme Matteo 65 playing on this thing by the time I’m done break, bud.”

Carlos sighs, dramatically. He digs around in his pocket for a second, and then taps something out on his phone. A second later, their chat blips.

**Satan is a RealMan (group mms)** **  
** COD   
_ Fcuk u. _

Jay laughs so hard he snorts and makes a grab for the game. “Fuck you, dude!” he cries “I’m going to take all of your apples and throw them in the ocean.”

Ben doesn’t remember a lot about Creature Intersection, but he’s pretty sure there’s no way to sabotage the game without like, actually destroying the game disk, and he’s pretty sure Jay isn’t going to do that. He’s also pretty sure that throwing fruit in the ocean just means you have to take the time to fish it back out, so it’s not like it’s even much of a threat, which is why he is utterly unprepared to suddenly become a convenient climbing structure for his boyfriends to use in their ongoing attempts to physically injure each other in the stupidest possible way. 

Ben ducks, just in case he’s going to get kicked in the head again. It’s safer this way, he’s found. Unfortunately, it also means that without the danger of giving the crown prince another black eye, he’s turned himself into a better human barrier, something that Carlos takes immediate advantage of.

“Hey!” Ben complains as he gets hit in the shoulder. He can’t feel his left arm, but oh, he sure can feel the foot digging into his kidney. Sometimes, human barriers have these fallible little things like their own body parts, and aren’t the best things for climbing on. “Ow.”

Jay doesn’t make any effort to help either boyfriend. “Can’t hide with Ben forever, short stuff.” he says instead, because he’s an asshole sometimes.

Ben can’t see, but he’s reasonably sure that wet noise was Carlos sticking his tongue out. He’s dating children, both of them.

“I don’t know,” he says, jokingly. It’s only after the words have left his mouth that he realizes how they could be construed, and even then, that’s mostly because the kid sitting  _ literally on top of his shoulders  _ goes shocked-still for a moment. Shit. Ben hurries to finish the thought before his pack can get it in their minds that he means something he’s not saying. “I don’t mind forever! Sounds kinda nice, having a permanent live-in boyfriend? I could keep you supplied with all the latest games, all the batteries you could ever ask for…”

Ben trails off. He’s not sure what else he can really offer, besides like, a whole castle, and that’s already on offer. Ice cream, maybe, but he’s talking to a therapist about working around the VK’s food issues, and right now they’re trying a thing where he doesn’t use food as any kind of reward, so it feels wrong to offer that. Batteries are a pretty specific thing to offer, maybe, but it’s something that he’s noticed Carlos and Jay hoarding like they’re literal gold, and they’re the dragons instead of Mal. It’s not the weirdest thing he’s noticed, but it’s a little strange, considering that the Isle does have power lines to get electricity, and none of the others have ever mentioned them being particularly unreliable such that they would need to hoard batteries. It’ll come up eventually, probably, but it doesn’t need to be today.

Jay pouts, because he’s a loser. “Aw, come on.” he whines. “I’m never gonna be able to compete with that. Even I can’t steal all the batteries in the world.” 

There’s a barely-there noise, almost a laugh, from somewhere uncomfortably close to Ben’s ear, and then Carlos is sliding down, off Ben’s shoulders and neatly into his lap. It’s more comfortable for Ben, at least. No worries about his arms going numb when he doesn’t have a person on his shoulders. Much more sustainable this way.

Carlos hooks his feet over Jay’s exposed leg and yanks, hard enough that it’s apparently worth it for Jay to kick back. Ouch. Ben’s leg is going to be black and blue by the end of this, but the attempt gets another breathy almost-laugh out of Carlos, so that’s worth any bruise. 

Jay is laughing too, somehow. “Oh, now that you’ve got Ben trapped, you want me over there too?” he says. “Sure you don’t want to just come back over here?” 

Carlos shakes his head and licks a wet stripe up the side of Ben’s face. 

Ben jerks his head back before he can help himself. “Agh!” 

That gets a real laugh, bordering on something that’s dangerously like a giggle. Ben tries not to think of Carlos as  _ cute,  _ because he’s really more of an awful goblin child who uses his veneer of cuteness to get people’s guard down before he takes shameless advantage of them, but it’s a little bit cute. 

“Come  _ here,  _ idiot,” Jay says, and then, oh, Ben’s losing his person. That’s fine. They can trade back off in a minute or so, and that’s okay. Compromise is good. They’re-- oh, well, okay, they might be trying to hurt each other again, but Carlos looks flushed and happy under his freckles, and Jay is spitting hair out of his mouth and pushing back, so that’s probably fine, then. 

Ben turns away for like,  _ two seconds  _ to wipe his face, because he’s  _ dripping spit,  _ which is gross and not hot no matter who’s put it there, and by the time he turns back, they’ve switched from tussling to full on making out. It wouldn’t be an unusual switch if one of the people instigating the violence is Mal, but it is kind of weird for this particular combination of hot-people-he-dates.

It should probably be weirder, watching people kiss from this close. It sounds weird, that’s for sure, all the little wet noises that seem so small when you’re the one making them amplified and kind of gross from this angle, but mostly it’s just  _ super fucking hot.  _ Like, Ben isn’t sure if he wants to be them or be in between them kinda hot.

Jay shifts his weight somehow, and Carlos flings out an arm to smack Ben. Ouch. Right. He doesn’t have to just think about being in between them, because he is a lucky, lucky person who has standing permission to insert himself into almost any combination of VK sandwich he wants, so long as he gives enough warning not to startle someone into pulling a knife. 

They break apart, panting, and Carlos flails a bit until he smacks Ben again. 

“Hey.” Ben says, teasing. “I can go--” 

That gets a response. “Stay.” Carlos says immediately, eyes dark and wide. “Don’t-- stay.” 

Jay sits back and pulls a handful of hair out of his face. “Hah! You just wanna watch us make out,” he says, twisting the handful around until he can wrap it out of the way. “Also come on, we wouldn’t kick you out of your own room, would we?” 

Ben shrugs. They kind of would, and he kind of does. Yesses all around, not that he’s gonna say that. To be fair, they wouldn’t kick him out per se, he’d just-- leave, if it seemed like the right thing to do. Sometimes Mal needs space, and Ben knows how to take a hint and leave her alone in those cases, but also yes, he does want to watch his boyfriends kiss some more, and maybe do a little bit of the kissing himself, if they’re open to it. 

“Oh,” Jay says, reaching over so that he’s touching Ben too. “We wouldn’t kick you out. For real. We’d probably be the ones to move if that happened. And like, it’s not gonna. We super want you here, right?” 

Carlos nods, enthusiastically. “ _ Super _ , yeah.” he says, barely even mocking Jay’s choice of word. “For real. Don’t go anywhere.” 

The hand on Ben’s leg tightens. “Yeah, don’t go anywhere,” Jay echoes. His mouth looks extremely kissable. “Come here?” 

Ben leans in.

He likes kissing, okay? It’s nice, the casual intimacy of being able to drop a kiss on someone’s head or cheek as you walk past, and kissing people for real is something Ben has always liked. It just feels  _ nice, _ and it’s easy to let himself drift into the feeling, the movement of their mouths and hands, long moments that fade together, into the push-pull rhythm of it. Ben’s pretty sure that kissing has never felt like this before, not even with Jay, who is by all accounts really, really good at this. When he pulls back to voice the thought, they both laugh at him.

“Well, yeah.” Jay says. “That’s like the whole point. Human evolutionary instinct or whatever. We’re supposed to want to touch and--” he makes a noise that could almost be nothing, the kind of noise you make when you almost swear in front of a teacher, or that Ben’s made himself when he almost told Mal to shut the fuck up in front of a camera crew. “Stuff. Y’know.” 

“Stuff?” Carlos echoes dryly, and how he manages to sound like that when he’s literally flopped over half underneath two sweaty bodies Ben will never understand, but he somehow makes it work. 

Jay snorts and reaches down to shove his hand through Carlos’s hair, pulling his head to the side and exposing the soft place on the side of his jaw where he likes to be kissed, when he’s in the right mood for kissing. “Yeah. You got a problem with my word choice, furball?” 

Carlos shakes his head as much as he can, but he looks ridiculously pleased with himself, and Ben would bet real gold that he’s pushing into Jay’s grip himself, the little jerk. 

It’s too hard to resist kissing him when he’s showing off like this, so sweetly it’s barely obvious that he’s doing it at all, and so Ben stops kissing Jay, and Jay stops kissing Ben, and they both switch to kissing Carlos instead. It goes on for longer than he would usually put up with, but it’s all clothes-on and above the waist and enthusiastic, so it seems pointless to worry. It’s really good, just kissing and touching like this, all electric where they’re skin-to-skin, hands and lips and the very edges of hips brushing together when they get close. 

It takes a good long while before anyone pulls back, but eventually Ben needs to breathe, and when he pulls back, it only takes another minute before Carlos is pushing Jay off too, shoving him with strong hands out of the way, breaking the point of contact that had been Jay’s mouth on his collarbone, biting like Ben knows he’s good at. 

No. Not getting distracted. Ben is being a good boy, and thinking about Jay’s wicked mouth on any part of his body is  _ not  _ helping his goal of being a good boyfriend right now. 

Fuck it. Ben pulls Jay over to give him a little last kiss of his own. Mm. Bitey. 

They pull apart with a noise that is definitely not a desperate gasp from Ben, because he is a mature and responsible young man who is good at things like figuring out how to breathe and knowing where his hands are. Which. Yeah. Maybe time to chill out a bit. 

“Okay, ew,” Carlos complains, shoving Jay off so that he falls mostly into Ben. Which is fine with Ben, to be clear. No complaints here. “Stop touching me with your dick. Nobody wants to feel that.” 

“Aww, baby,” Jay says, making a face as he moves obligingly off. “That’s not true.”

Carlos stretches out. “Nhg.” he says, eloquently. “ _ I  _ don’t wanna feel it. Go somewhere else if you wanna keep playing. Take Ben with you, or whatever.”

Jay glances over at Ben. “You wanna?” he asks. 

Um. 

“Sure,” Ben says slowly. He does want to, kind of a lot actually, but. “Uh--”

Carlos waves a hand. “I’m good,” he says. “For real. You can do whatever for a little while. S’cool.” 

“Are you sure? I don’t wanna leave if, like….” Ben trails off. He’s not sure, exactly, what might happen, but it feels wrong to leave without checking.

Carlos snorts. “What, if I have an emergency and only your dicks can save me? It’s fine, really. I got what I wanted.”

It’s true, clearly. He looks flushed and warm now, satisfied in a way that Ben doesn’t often see on him. The hickies on his throat don’t hurt either. 

“If you’re sure,” Ben says, just in case it’s really not okay and Carlos just isn’t speaking up for some unknown, mysterious reason. It’s been known to happen. “You’ll yell if you need us, right?”

Carlos is already patting down the bed for his phone. “Uh-huh.” he says, distracted. “S’cool.” 

Jay is already up and clearly ready to go. “We’ll be like, five minutes man, it’s fine.” he says, and it’s that more than anything, the casual reassurance that yeah, they’re gonna be back before anything else can go wrong, that convinces Ben. 

“Okay,” he says “Uh. Yeah. If you’re sure.” 

Jay actually whoops, because he is a  _ loser  _ and okay, yeah, Ben understands the sentiment, but he wasn’t gonna say it that way. He’s trying to have some dignity left, thank you very much. 

“Have fu-un!” Carlos yells after them as Jay drags Ben into the bathroom. “Make good choices!” 

Jay makes a gesture back that even Ben understands, and shuts the door on the sound of Carlos laughing at them. 

+++

As it turns out, all of the mind-body theorists that Mal likes to make fun of every time they come up in her psychology book are right. There’s no way that the mind and the body can be one unit, because Carlos feels fucking _great_ in body, full up on physical affection and seriously the most relaxed that he’s been in weeks, and just plain old fucked up in the mind. 

It’s not-- 

Except it kind of is---

Carlos rolls over, screams as quietly as he can into the nearest pillow, and then flops over onto his back again so he can text Evie and not get a crick in his neck. It’s weird, not having her here. Ever since she joined up, Evie’s been the first person he goes to when the feeling of being fucked up yet again by the good old genetic lottery starts creeping back in. 

The phone feels like lead in his hands. Like something that’s worse than lead. Not just heavy, but dangerous to touch, something that’ll start to burn if he holds onto it for too long. Straight bleach, maybe. The crystal stuff, that sticks to wet skin and won’t wipe off until it’s bringing a layer of skin off with it. It wouldn’t be so hard to cover a phone in that stuff. Stick it to a case, make it look like one of the colorful crystal ones that the girls carry around, and then just wait until his hands are wet, and-- 

Carlos drops the phone. It’s just a phone, he doesn’t need to wash his hands. There’s nothing there. Nothing that’s actually dangerous in a cell phone, not without some serious modifications, and he wouldn’t put those on his own phone, on any of the phones he’s been modding up for people. He could, for sure, but-- 

Ow. There’s not enough skin left on the edge of his fingertips to pick at anymore. It’s all pink and raw, and touching it hurts. He lifts a hand up to his mouth on instinct-- 

Bleach. Don’t put it in your mouth, you won’t get any sympathy when it burns. No poison control on the prison colony, so better make yourself puke and hope it’s enough. Don’t put your hands in your mouth until they’re clean, no matter how much they hurt. It’s better in the long run if your hands are cracked and bleeding, because it’ll show prospective alphas that you know how to work, bitch. 

Fuck. 

He could also just not text Evie.. Put down the phone, go back to the comforting blur of creature intersection, plant some nice flowers, and wait until Evie gets mad enough to call someone else. Take a problem, make it a different problem. Carlos is good at that, reshaping problems. It’s a strength. The teachers here don’t comment on it, but people back home did. Teachers here are usually too busy writing down things in the student portal about how he doesn’t pay attention in class. Which is usually true, because some classes here are dumb and not worth paying attention to. It’s basic conservation of energy. If class A takes X amount of energy and project B takes Y amount of energy, and student C doesn’t have enough to go around, how long until someone notices the deficit? 

Too long, apparently. 

Carlos rubs his hands hard against the rough fabric of his shorts. Okay. There’s nothing to clean off his hands, because there’s nothing on the phone, and it’s fine to touch. 

Phone in his right hand. Left one-- okay, it’s fine to have that hand in his mouth. Lots of people bite their nails when they’re stressed. Ben doesn’t, because he’s good in every way that matters, and Evie doesn’t, because she puts a lot of effort, even back home when she only had mostly empty bottles of polish, into keeping her nails nice. Mal does, which isn’t that comforting because Mal is also a mess, and Jay doesn’t, because he keeps his nails cut short enough that they won’t snag on anything when he’s putting his hands into other people’s pockets. 

It’s fine. 

There’s already a text waiting, which is a little worrying. Evie’s not great at taking the hands-off approach when it comes to micromanaging other people’s lives, so one text from her is actually worse than fifty missed calls from Mal. Or it would be, if Mal didn’t hate her phone. Missed calls from Ben, maybe. He’s more the type.

**txt from: Evie** **  
** _ please tell me you’re okay _

COD   
_ yeah. _

The typing bubble pops up immediately. Shit.

Evie   
_ u sure??? _ _   
_ _ everyone stopped answering the group chat. _ _   
_ _ I’m done for the day if you need anything _ _   
_ _ Mal’s pretty easy to keep an eye on while she’s in an exam _

COD   
_ I’m okay. _

He is, technically. There’s a roof over his head and a reasonably good door between him and anyone who would intentionally start shit. That’s pretty fucking okay in his book. Warm, dry, not sick, not hungry, not bleeding.

It’s also probably not what Evie wants to hear. She keeps trying to get them all to talk about their emotional state and stuff, how they’re feeling, what they want to do about the college prep exams that are coming up in the spring, how they would feel if she took some of her Auradon friends up on their offers to help her set up a business website so she can get them someplace to live over the summer that’s not the dorms.

Carlos  _ feels  _ like he would rather not be in touch with his emotions, personally. Been there, done that, got the screaming nightmares already, thanks. Evie seems to like it when he makes an effort though and making Evie happy is pretty much always worth it.

COD   
_ Ben picked me up. He’s still being all nice and stuff. Didn’t wanna go in your room so we’re hanging in his. J’s here too. _ _   
_ _ I haven’t totally flipped out yet are u proud. _

Evie’s reply pops up almost as soon as he hits send.

Evie:   
_ so proud _ _   
_ _ if I just happen to swing by my room before I stop over by you guys is there anything you might want? _

What Carlos really wants is to not be an inconvenience for everyone. That would be a nice fucking change. Not being forced by fucking biological necessity into being all vulnerable, and shit. That’d be cool.

Or like, Mal’s painting hoodie. That’d be nice to have too.

COD   
_ can you bring Mal’s hoodie _ _   
_ _ it’s in her laundry _

Evie   
_ This one? _ _   
_ _ (img: hoodie) _

It’s a plain black hoodie. Evie doesn’t like them wearing stuff that she hasn’t picked out herself, but Mal pulled this one from the barge piles just for painting and usually only wears it when she’s trying not to get paint that doesn’t match her color scheme on her own clothes, so Evie lets her get away with it. It’s got red and yellow and blue paint smudges all up the sleeves, and there’s a patch on the hip where Mal wipes off the top of her cans when they get crusty and clogged up that’s got purple and green splotches too. 

There’s almost none of Mal’s actual smell in the hoodie. It smells like paint stripper and burned out aerosol cans. Just a touch of burnt food in the seams, from all the times Mal would try to heat up dinner in the hideout and leave the pan on until it got thick and black and crusty enough to drive up under your nails in little splinters when you tried to chip the leftovers out of the bottom. The sweet smells of home. 

COD   
_ yea _ _   
_ _ can i steal your blanket too _

The blanket smells like Auradon-home, like Evie’s new sweet soap and like the fancy acrylic paints that Mal’s been using lately to get more precise designs on their things. There’s no image this time, but it’s going to be the blue blanket that Evie’s been keeping out on her bed for this exact purpose. 

Evie   
_ ofc _ _   
_ _ need anything else? _

Evie’s typing bubble pops up, and then goes away again. Sometimes that happens when there’s a bad connection, but nope, still four blips strong. Evie’s probably mad. She doesn’t usually revise her texts unless she’s trying not to show how pissed she is at someone.

There are downsides to having fingers that move faster than your brain sometimes.

COD   
_...you? _

Yikes. Like that, okay. Too much, too needy, and if Evie really is pissed, she’s going to see it as an obvious ploy. Look cute, think fast, that’s how they did it on the isle, and if you can’t think fast enough, you’d better hope that you’re  _ really  _ fucking cute.

COD   
_ I’m just being needy. Stay with Mal. Don’t do anything dumb _

Evie   
_ :(((( _

Oh, thank the fucking gods. She’s not mad. Long emoticons are a good sign with Evie.

COD   
_ fr tho can you bring meds _ _   
_ _ not really looking to be a complete mess this time _

Evie   
_ on it _

It’s probably not the worst idea to ask for the other ones too.

COD   
_ maybe also the ones in the side table? Blue bottle.  _ _   
_ _ sry :( _

Evie   
_ aw baby _ _   
_ _ that bad? _

Carlos considers. It’s bad, but not the worst. There’s the awful skin-crawly feeling of being  _ not-safe,  _ but the feeling hasn’t progressed to outright paranoia yet. He kind of wants to curl up somewhere warm and dark and never see another person outside of his pack again, but that’s not outside the realm of normal, considering. 

COD   
_ kinda _ _   
_ _ I mostly don’t wanna flip out without everyone here _ _   
_ _ rather be sleepy _

He could power through without the pills. It wouldn’t be fun, but it would be doable. A little extra irrational twitching, a little less sleep, and he would get through it.

But. They’re still working on the idea that sometimes, things are allowed to just be easy. Just because he  _ can  _ power through something doesn’t mean he  _ has  _ to do it. He’s got the meds for a reason, and the Auradon psych wouldn’t have given them to him unless she wanted him to use them sometimes.

Evie’s reply pops up after a second.

Evie:   
_ I got you. _ _   
_ _ in the least patronizing way possible _ _   
_ _ good job taking care of yourself bby _ _   
_ _!!! _

COD   
_ yeah _

Evie   
_ I’m going by the dining hall too _ _   
_ _ u don't get a choice abt that _

Ugh. Dining hall food is nice in that it shows up every day at the same time and he doesn’t have to be the one to cook it, but it also sucks in that there’s no control over mealtimes and if you miss more than one meal in a row the staff in charge of keeping the students like, alive and safe and stuff start asking questions. Apparently “growing up on a prison colony” and “not being used to eating regular meals” isn’t enough of a reason to skip dinner sometimes, which is stupid. Sometimes going downstairs to eat dinner with everybody else around just feels  _ wrong,  _ and it’s not like he’d be able to eat anything on days like that, so it just makes sense to hide upstairs in the dorms and keep working on more useful stuff. 

COD   
_ :( _

Evie   
_ suck it up bby _ _   
_ _ I’ll bring you tea or something  _ _   
_ _ maybe a brownie if there’s any left  _ _   
_ _ be there soon  _

COD   
_ :thumbsup: _

+++

Mal opens her phone after she leaves her history of magical creatures exam. She flicks through the messages: boring, unnecessary, boring. She read most of their group chat over Evie’s shoulder before their exams started, but there are an awful lot of notifications there, and it might be worth taking a look. Maybe Ben’s sent another one of his encouraging baby animal pictures, with the jokes underneath. It’s unlikely, but Mal will take anything to forget the hour she’s just spent writing a timed essay about dragon courting rituals in the days before the Auradon alliance.

There are three messages from Evie, but those are sure to be good, and besides, Mal likes to save Evie’s texts for last.

Mal taps on the box for their group text

**VKs All Day (group mms) (19 unread)**

Blah, blah. Mal scrolls up through the messages, trying to find the point where the new messages start and the ones she’s already read on Evie’s phone end. There’s some stuff from Ben, the same raccoon picture he sent before her exam started, and then some stuff-- oh, huh. New messages, sent from Evie not so long ago, after she got out of the exam early, in response to a cryptic text from Ben asking when they’re done. Huh. Mal scrolls further.

Benny Boo   
_ Plz don’t worry! Focus on your exam :) _

JJ   
_ done for the day!!!  _ _   
_ _ anyone got eyes on @ COD _

Eves <3   
_ NO?????? _ _   
_ _ HE WAS WITH YOU???? _

JJ   
_ no????? _ _   
_ _ he finished early??? _

Benny Boo   
_ come to mine when you’re done _ _   
_ _ at everyone _ _   
_ _ But esp at JJ _

Eves <3   
_ RU?????? gOOD????? _

Benny Boo   
_ yeah  _

COD   
_ :thumbs up: _

That’s-- potentially bad. That could definitely be a problem, but unless there are missed calls that Mal isn’t seeing, it’s not bad enough to distract from the Evie-texts she has waiting. Mal taps out of the message screen without adding anything and taps into her message thread with Evie.

**txt from: Evie (3)** **  
** _ call me when you get out babe _ _   
_ _ Seriously. _ _   
_ _ call me _

Well. That sure isn’t ideal.

Mal taps on the call button for Evie’s contact. It gets through less than a complete ring cycle before there’s a click, and Evie’s voice comes through.

“Hey, Mal! Babe! Are you done for the day yet?” Evie chirps.

Okay. Okay. Pivot, Mal. Exams, yeah. “I’ve got math in an hour.” Mal says.

Evie sounds slightly breathless, like she’s moving fast. “Great, okay! How about you stay out of the room, uh, until that’s over with? Does that sound good?”

“What’s going on?”

“Nothing we can’t handle for a few hours!” Evie says. Which. That’s not right.

Mal puts some oomph into her voice. “Evie.” she says sternly. “Eves.”

“We’re good. Really!” Evie’s expression is practically visible through the phone. They are absolutely not good, if Mal is reading this right. Hopefully, they aren’t in crisis mode, though, not if Evie was willing to wait for Mal to check her phone and call instead of hunting her down.

“Why don’t you want me home?” Mal asks. She’s pretty damn sure she knows why.  _ Fuck.  _ They had been doing so well keeping it together too.

“No reason. You know, just, normal stuff which I can totally talk about in public at this moment!”

Mal is probably projecting the guilty note in Evie’s voice there. “Why are you in public?” she asks. There’s a crackle, like maybe Evie’s got a bad connection, or she’s moving the phone around a lot.

“We needed some stuff.”

“What stuff?”

Evie is definitely moving around. “Meds and stuff. Some things from our room. The usual, okay? We just weren’t thinking, and now I need to do some shuffling around.”

Oh. A couple more things click into place in Mal’s head. “The boys are in Ben’s room.” she realizes.

“Yes. They are.”

The boys are hiding out with Ben, which probably means that they’re intentionally staying away from Mal, which could be good or bad. Evie’s in on it, which probably means good, and she didn’t call, she waited, so it’s not an emergency, and she wants Mal to focus on her exams, so that’s what she’s got to do, and going alpha on their sorry asses isn’t going to work if she wants to pass these things, so-- “I shouldn’t go see them until my exams are done.”

Evie lets out a breath. “No, you should not. Good for recognizing that, babe!”

“Am I allowed to see you?” Mal asks. She needs to double check that she’s not being cut off from her pack entirely. They wouldn’t do that, probably, but she needs to be sure.

“Aww, of course babe!” Evie sounds pleased at the attention, so that’s a good sign. “I’m-- where are you?”

“Outside the library.”

“I’ll come to you, okay? Meet me in the dining hall?”

The dining hall isn’t exactly close to the library. It’s not close to the residential rooms either, which is probably where Evie’s coming from. It’s a weird choice, from any geographic standpoint. “Where are you?” Mal asks.

Evie doesn’t answer. “See you in a bit!” she says instead and hangs up.

Huh. Evie’s got it under control, probably. She usually does. Based on the background noise during the call, she was probably leaving the dorms as she was hanging up, and she walks fast, but maybe not so fast if she’s carrying stuff, so she’s going to be at the dining hall in maybe five minutes if she decides to really book it.

Mal’s going to make it there in three.

+++

Evie hangs up on Mal. Damnit. She’d been hoping—well.

No point in hoping for things that weren’t going to happen anyway. Mal can’t stay in an exam room forever, so it’s better in the long run that Evie is going to be able to head her off right away before she tries to catch up to people, and can’t, and flips out about it. Better that Evie has to do a little extra work now, rather than them all paying for it later when Mal decides to flame out and set something more dangerous than the curtains on fire.

Oh, right. She’s got to let the others know, now, that she’s going to be late coming up. Mal takes priority, they’re going to understand that, but it’s still going to be better for them if she can get there sooner rather than later.

Evie thumbs her phone back open.

**txt to: COD** **  
** _ gonna be a minute baby _ _   
_ _ I have to talk to Mal real quick and them I’m yours I swear _

COD   
_ :thumbsup: _

Damn. He’s fine, he’s got to be fine so long as he’s hanging out with their boys, but Evie really would like to check up on them herself. Mal’s got to take priority though, which is-- fine. Mal is the light of her life, and all that. Her girlfriend, in a way that goes beyond what she’s got with the others. They’re all her pack, and she loves all of them, heart and body and soul, but Mal is special, and Evie loves her in a way that’s maybe a little bit more Auradon-approved than the rest of her relationships. 

Boyfriends are nice and all, but they’ve talked about it as a pack, as a  _ family,  _ and if they ever have to pretend to be something less than what they are, Evie gets to keep Mal. 

+++

Mal corners Evie the second she walks into the dining hall, before she’s even finished brushing the snow off her shoulders.

“What’s going on?” Mal demands. “Is everyone okay?”

Evie flicks her hair out of her face and lets Mal fall into step with her as she walks over to the coffee dispenser. Evie’s usually a green tea kind of girl, but exams bring out the worst in people.

“Everything is fine.” Evie says calmly, pulling a to-go cup down from the shelf. There’s an elf sitting on it, next to the coffee swizzle sticks. Disgusting. “It’s under control.”

Mal is going to scream. “Everything is fine.” she repeats. “Great! Fucking-- wonderful. What  _ is  _ everything?”

Evie pulls her coffee, adds vanilla creamer from the little fridge that sits next to the coffee machine on the counter, and gives it all a swirl before she answers. “Walk with me, babe,” she says, picking up her cup.

Mal follows her out of the main dining room, through to the side room where the foreign language tables meet during dinner hours. There’s an ungodly amount of tinsel over the door, taunting her. It would be so easy to rig some buckets of it to fall on people. But she’s not going to do that, because she’s  _ good  _ now, and Auradon girls don’t throw buckets of awful sparkly crap at people who clog up the toaster line by trying to shove frosted muffins in the rotary toaster.

“The boys are in Ben’s room.” Evie says, sipping her drink. She wrinkles her nose at the taste. It must be burnt today, or else the staff have switched the student blend to half-caf again. “They’re all okay.”

“The more you tell me that the less I believe you.”

“I know. Did you read the group text?” Evie asks, unbothered. At Mal’s nod, she gives a small smile. “Great, okay! So, as far as we can tell, what happened is, uh, Carlos woke up feeling bad this morning and just decided not to tell the rest of us?” She lifts one hand, a gentle what-can-you-do motion. “And he’s done with exams now, so I think he decided to be an idiot and just power through? Ben picked him up after he left the exam room, but I’m not entirely clear on the details. They’re both fine now, they’re both done with exams and hanging out in Ben’s rooms. Jay is with them right now. He’s done for the day. Following?”

Oh, Mal is following all right. Her pack is a bunch of morons. She nods. “Yeah.”

Evie dips her chin back at Mal. “We need to get through our exams tomorrow, and then we’re clear, and we need to do it without triggering what happened last time. If we keep a consistent group together, it won’t be as bad as when we were in and out the whole day.”

Mal, for all that she feels like a fool leading a whole goddamned troupe sometimes, catches on quickly when she needs to. “I need to stay out.”

Evie is kind enough to wince. “Yes.” she says firmly. “I’ll stay with you, once I drop this off.” she gestures to the bag slung over her shoulder. It’s big, probably stuffed with jackets or blankets or other familiar things which will be easy to cozy up in. “We both have, what, two exams tomorrow?”

Mal doesn’t know. “Yeah.” she says anyway. “Think so.”

Evie nods. “Once we get through those, we’re clear. Mine are in the morning, and then I’m done, and I can spend time with our boys. Yours are--?”

Oh. Huh. Not in the early morning slot, that’s all Mal remembers. She’s not like Evie, she doesn’t carry a color-coded calendar around everywhere she goes. She takes it one second at a time, like mother nature intended. “I don’t know.” she admits. “The second one’s in the early afternoon slot, though. And then I’m done too.” 

Evie sighs, like she does when Mal forgets which lip gloss she’s supposed to wear and ends up ruining her whole organization system. “Okay. You need to stay out of Ben’s rooms until then.”

Ouch. “You think I can’t control myself?” Mal asks. She can’t, Evie’s right, but it still hurts to hear her say it like that.

Evie puts down her cup and presses a coffee-scented kiss to Mal’s forehead. “Mal, babe,” she says. “I love you. I  _ know  _ you won’t be able to focus on an exam if you’re all alpha-ed up. It is  _ extremely  _ sweet that you care so much, but you really, really can’t go in there.”

Yeah. That’s fair. Mal’s a type-A alpha. She’s the reason why wicked lady alphas are a stereotype, basically. (And it’s still wild to think that somebody actually bothered to study the different types of alpha brain-hormone-whatever responses, much less categorize them and publish a self-selection test that’s available in any applied psychology book written in the last twenty years). As much as men like to say that they’re all big strong alphas who would fight for their packs, most of them don’t have the neural pathways to go batshit insane like Mal does when her pack is hurting. 

“Right.” Mal says. “Yeah. I can’t see them.”

Evie shakes her head, setting her perfect curls bouncing. She really put in her best effort today, to bring good luck in their exam, or something. Look your best to perform your best, that was the logic she attacked Mal with this morning when she put mascara and lip gloss on Mal too, before she could even sneak down to the coffee station. Mal might be the only type-A alpha in their crew, but Evie can be just as insane about some things when she wants to be. 

“You really can’t, babe,” Evie says with a frown. “I’m sorry.”

Mal shrugs. These things happen. “I get it. I’ll leave them alone.” She won’t be happy about it, but she’ll do it. After what happened last time, she’s not going to do anything that could mess up their Pack Shit, as Ben’s been calling it, this month.

Evie lets out a huge sigh and reaches for her coffee again. “Thank you.” she breathes. “Really truly. I’ll see you as soon as your exam gets out, okay? We can study together. I’ll make you tea, or something.”

What Mal really wants to do is steal Evie’s coffee and take care of her boys herself, but that’s not an option, so she’ll make this work instead. She leans over to steal a coffee-flavored kiss from Evie’s perfect lips, lingering for just a second when Evie presses up into it.

They break apart. Evie’s already gathering up her stuff, even though Mal would be happy to blow off her exam crunch time and just hang out with Evie instead. She could walk Evie up to drop off the stuff, make sure nobody is hanging out around Ben’s door or anything. She could-- nope. Bad idea, Mal. Gotta think about long-term consequences again.

Evie picks up Mal’s hand from where she’s been gripping the table so hard there’s a little heat mark where her fingers were. “Do you want me to walk you to your exam?” Evie asks. “I can come with you, it’s not too far out of my way.”

Right. Regrouping. Exam season. Not the time to go insane. “Sure.” Mal says. “If you want.”

Evie’s answering smile is brilliant as always. “I always wanna see you, babe.” she says. “I’ll walk you over.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please tell me why I have a list of 22 fake video game titles that I wrote down back in December for this dcom fic. 
> 
> (One of them is called Cry of Destiny and it’s a pretty violent alternate history/sci-fi shooter game that’s very popular with the high school set and gets abbreviated on the Auradon internet forums as CoD which is TOTALLY not relevant for any screen names that were uhhh…..in this chapter….because I would NEVER imply that these characters are NERDS who would do a thing like make their screen name after a video game…) 
> 
> As always, I am on the tumblr! I'm TheBluestBlueWords over there, come say hi!


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